Toward a critical rhetoric of risk communication: Producing citizens and the role of technical communicators

Facebook users' intentions in risk communication and food-safety issues

“…By contrast, cognitive psychology theory provides a research framework to examine the risk perception, affective and behavioral responses of the public (Mirel, 1994;Slovic, 1987). A conventional standard of success for risk communication indicates the efficient knowledge transfer (Grabill & Simmons, 1998;Tuner, Rimal, Morrison, & Kim, 2006). The unknown risk seems to be unobservable, unknown and new hazards as the basis for contemporary risk research (Fleming, Thorson, & Zhang, 2006).…”

“…The risk contains three elements including undesirable outcomes, possibility of occurrence, and state of reality (Ratzan, 2011). The concept of risk as a social concept raises considerable academic interest among researchers from different disciplines including risk assessment, cognitive psychology, and communication (Grabill & Simmons, 1998;Tucker, Whaley, & Sharp, 2006). By contrast, cognitive psychology theory provides a research framework to examine the risk perception, affective and behavioral responses of the public (Mirel, 1994;Slovic, 1987).…”

Giving Voice to the Silenced: Using Critical Discourse Analysis to Inform Crisis Communication Theory

“…The challenge was successful and the authors noted the importance of recognizing the social aspect of discourse, and its relationship to power, when planning major projects (Linnros and Hallin 2001). Grabill and Simmons (1998) use the environmental example of DDT to introduce an argument for what they call a critical rhetoric for risk communication. Risk communication is slightly different than crisis communication in that the former is meant to communicate the risks of certain activities, chemicals, processes, etc.…”

“…The authors argue vehemently that risk communication should apply the tenets of discourse analysis in an effort to make risk communication more accessible and understandable. Grabill and Simmons insist that considering Foucauldian notions of power is essential so that corporate owners do not attempt to force the corporate view of the risk onto employees, and rely exclusively on the words and perspectives of subject matter experts in crafting risk messages (Grabill and Simmons 1998).…”

The risk/no-risk rhetoric of environmental impact assessments (EIA): the case of offshore wind farms in Sweden

“…The claim that risk communication stands for a political matter where "competing parties employ rhetoric and political pressure to impose operating standards on one another" (Heath and Nathan, 1990-1, p. 17) can therefore be echoed by the proposal to develop rhetoric into a critical tool with which one examines the social conditions of risk construction and risk communication (Grabill and Simmons 1998). Before we bring these insights into use in our analysis of the rhetoric of risk in EIA, we first introduce the case and our methodology.…”