Perceiving Environmental Risks: (v. 5 Readings in Environmental Psychology S.)

In his opening chapter, the editor discusses the variety of perspectives that are taken into account when studying the perception and management of risk, thereby indicating the multidisciplinary perspective that needs to be embraced if risks are to be effectively managed. Many psychologists are uncomfortable in such a sea of viewpoints, and this is probably one reason why there have been so few of them to tackle these important topics. The dearth of research enhances the studies that have been published in the "Journal of Environmental Psychology". Assembling this research in one volume provides direct and convenient access to the original studies that are establishing the basis for a growing area of significant research. The areas of psychological study that open up by the consideration of papers in the present volume are also central to many questions asked in the heartland of academic psychology: the most appropriate ways to categorize cognition, the impact of context on perception, ways of summarizing and resolving differing conceptual systems. This present volume should therefore be of value to cognitive and social psychologists who wish to inject major real world issues into what might otherwise be arid debates.

Table of Contents:
Preface, D. Canter; introduction - risk management in its social and political context, T. O'Riordan; the coverage of risk perception in the "Journal of Environmental Psychology", T. O'Riordan; editorial - psychological aspects of environmental risk, D. Canter et al. Part 1 Characterizing hazard: classifying hazardous events, G. Cverkovich and T.C. Earle; public perceptions of science - what Seascale said about the Black Report, S.M. Macgill; levels of environmental decisions, O. Svenson and B. Fischhoff. Part 2 Risk perceptions: public attitudes to nuclear energy - salience and anxiety, J. van der Pligt; nuclear attitudes after Chernobyl - a cross-national study, J.R. Eiser et al; public responses to the Chernobyl accident, O. Renn; what was the meaning of Chernobyl?, T.C. Earle and G. Cvetkovich; public perceptions of electric power transmission lines, L. Furby et al; parental concern about children's traffic safety in residential neighbourhoods, T. Garling et al; prediction of environmental risk over very long time scales, J.C. Baird; sources of evaluation of nuclear and renewable energy contained in the local press, R. Spears et al. Part 3 Risk valuation: children's perceptions of nuclear power stations as revealed through their drawings, J.M. Brown et al; how the Sizewell B inquiry is grappling with the concept of acceptable risk, T. O'Riordan et al.