Risk Communication: Challenges for Toxicologists and Other Risk Experts

Abstract

This chapter is primarily written for scientists concerned with the assessment of risks for human health or the environment and involved in communicating and explaining scientific risk issues to the public. Besides following basic rules of good communication, risk experts have to find solutions to overcome specific barriers in the dialogue with differently educated protagonists of the public, i.e., laymen, stakeholders, well-informed citizens, other experts, and also with public media. This includes adapting the dialogue to the audience, to explain complex scientific facts and their legal context perspicuously, and to achieve trust and a truthful dialogue atmosphere when discussing with citizens or stakeholders. Eventually, the risk expert should contribute to reach agreements or other options (including disagreements) when discussing risks. For the interaction with public media, the risk expert should keep particular rules in mind. In conclusion, awareness of obstacles in communication and acquiring special communication skills and training are mandatory for scientists in the role of risk experts before discussing risks in a public setting.

Institutions involved in risk communication issues, such as many authorities and enterprises, should develop concepts and long-term strategies to build up confidence as an indispensable basis of successful risk communication. Essential prerequisites of such confidence are i) scientific competence and legal independence of the risk experts within the institution (as far as possible by contract) and ii) transparency and a two-way communication between the institution, stakeholders, and the public.