Perceptions of Pesticides as Risks to Human Health

This chapter attempts to show the depth and complexity of the public's concerns regarding the risks from pesticides and other chemicals. These concerns transcend national borders and seem to have held remarkably constant for several decades, in spite of views of many toxicologists and other scientists that are quite the opposite from public views. The heavy reliance on testing of chemicals with animals and the quantitative risk assessment that has developed during this same time period may have reinforced and maintained the public's fears of pesticides and other chemicals. Research has also demonstrated that social response to risk is closely related to the position of a hazard within this space. The farther to the right a hazard appears, the higher its perceived risk, the more people want to see its current risks reduced, and the more they want to see strict regulation employed to achieve reduced risk. Risk communication efforts conducted by public relations specialists cannot turn public views around and may, in fact, exacerbate them. Some investigators have taken the limitations of risk science, the difficulty of creating and maintaining trust, and the subjective nature of risk judgments as signs pointing to the need for a radically different approach to dealing with conflicts regarding pesticides and other chemical products.