Risk Communication

A brief history of professional risk communication

Risk communication as a dedicated subfield emerged in the mid-20th century, in response to the growth of the nuclear industry according to Dominic Way et al. (p. 17). The U.S. government emphasized communicating risks of the nuclear industry to education and healthcare sectors, as well as the general public. Most of the applications of this new field addressed environmental and technological concerns, using what is referred to by Way et al. as a “technocratic top-down approach”. This approach attempted to bring the layperson’s perspectives, or risk assessments, in line with those of “experts” by providing "complete information" about risks and appropriate responses. This general strategy “alienated the public” and failed to account for experts’ biases in risk assessment. Artifacts were crammed with information that audiences thought were unreadable and irrelevant. As the field has matured, a more complete understanding of risk in social, cultural, and political contexts, as well as applying more communication theory to official risk communication, have led to improvements in artifact usability and general communication effectiveness (p. 17). This theme of holistic perspectives in risk communication is a common one in the research I will analyze.

The beginning of benefit-risk communication in the pharmaceutical industry is traced back to the thalidomide travesty during the early 1960's in the UK (thalidomide was a drug given to pregnant women that caused severe birth defects in children). The authors state that “explicit regulatory interest in risk communication (or what later became known as ‘benefit–risk communication’) did not emerge until at least the mid-1990s” (p. 18). They argue that the “traditional” format of medicine practice (involving a “paternalistic” relationship between doctor and patient), established by the Hippocratic Oath’s language and propagated in various medical literature thereafter, created inertia against change in the field of communicating benefits and risks of treatment to patients. A shift toward transparency and patient inclusivity occurred in the late 20th century, with a focus on clear communication to patients of benefits and risks of medical treatment options and pharmaceutical products such as drugs and vaccines (p. 18).