IPCC Report.pdf - Adam Curry

Chapter 1Climate Change: New Dimensions in Disaster Risk, Exposure, Vulnerability, and ResilienceBox 1-3 | Influence of Cognitive Processes, Culture, and Ideology on Judgments about RiskA variety of cognitive, cultural, and social processes affect judgments about risk and about the allocation of efforts to address theserisks. In addition to the processes described in Section 1.3.1.2, subjective judgments may be influenced more by emotional reactions toevents (e.g., feelings of fear and loss of control) than by analytic assessments of their likelihood (Loewenstein et al., 2001). Peoplefrequently ignore predictions of extreme events if those predictions fail to elicit strong emotional reactions, but will also overreact tosuch forecasts when the events elicit feelings of fear or dread (Slovic et al., 1982; Slovic 1993, 2010; Weber, 2006). Even with sufficientinformation, everyday concerns and satisfaction of basic wants may prove a more pressing concern than attention and effort towardactions to address longer-term disaster risk (Maskrey, 1989, 2011; Wisner et al., 2004).In addition to being influenced by cognitive shortcuts (Kahneman and Tversky, 1979), the perceptions of risk and extremes and reactionsto such risk and events are also shaped by motivational processes (Weber, 2010). Cultural theory combines insights from anthropologyand political science to provide a conceptual framework and body of empirical studies that seek to explain societal conflict over risk(Douglas, 1992). People’s worldview and political ideology guide attention toward events that threaten their desired social order(Douglas and Wildavsky, 1982). Risk in this framework is defined as the disruption of a social equilibrium. Personal beliefs also influencewhich sources of expert forecasts of extreme climate events will be trusted. Different cultural groups put their trust into differentorganizations, from national meteorological services to independent farm organizations to the IPCC; depending on their values, beliefs,and corresponding mental models, people will be receptive to different types of interventions (Dunlap and McCright, 2008; Malka andKrosnick, 2009). Judgments about the veracity of information regarding the consequences of alternative actions often depend on theperceived consistency of those actions with an individual’s cultural values, so that individuals will be more willing to consider informationabout consequences that can be addressed with actions seen as consistent with their values (Kahan and Braman, 2006; Kahan et al., 2007).Factual information interacts with social, institutional, and cultural processes in ways that may amplify or attenuate public perceptions ofrisk and extreme events (Kasperson et al., 1988). The US public’s estimates of the risk of nuclear power following the accident at ThreeMile Island provide an example of the socio-cultural filtering of engineering safety data. Social amplification increased public perceptionsof the risk of nuclear power far beyond levels that would derive only from analysis of accident statistics (Fischhoff et al., 1983). The public’stransformation of expert-provided risk signals can serve as a corrective mechanism by which cultural subgroups of society augment ascience-based risk analysis with psychological risk dimensions not considered in technical risk assessments (Slovic, 2000). Evidence fromhealth, social psychology, and risk communication literature suggests that social and cultural risk amplification processes modifyperceptions of risk in either direction and in ways that may generally be socially adaptive, but can also bias reactions in sociallyundesirable ways in specific instances (APA, 2009).risk reduction, risk transfer, and disaster management actions will ingeneral differ, the framework can help inform judgments about aneffective mix of such actions in any particular case (see UNISDR, 2011,for efforts at stratifying different risk levels as a prelude to finding themost adequate mix of disaster risk management actions).Probabilistic risk analysis is, however, rarely implemented in its pureform, in part because quantitative estimates of hazard and vulnerabilityare not always available and are not numbers that are independent ofthe individuals making those estimates. Rather, these estimates aredetermined by a combination of direct physical consequences of anevent and the interaction of psychological, social, institutional, andcultural processes (see Box 1-3). For instance, perceptions of the risks of anuclear power plant may be influenced by individuals’ trust in the peopleoperating the plant and by views about potential linkages betweennuclear power and nuclear weapons proliferation – factors that may notbe considered in a formal risk assessment for any given plant. Given thissocial construction of risk (see Section 1.1.2.2), effective allocations ofefforts among risk reduction, risk transfer, and disaster managementmay best emerge from an integrated risk governance process, whichincludes the pre-assessment, appraisal, characterization/evaluation, andongoing communications elements. Disaster risk management andadaptation to climate change each represent approaches that alreadyuse or could be improved by the use of this risk governance process, butas described in Section 1.3.1, climate change poses a particular set ofadditional challenges.Together, the implications of probabilistic risk analysis and the socialconstruction of risk reinforce the following considerations with regard tothe effective allocation and implementation of efforts to manage risksin both disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change:• As noted in Section 1.1, vulnerability, exposure, and hazard areeach critical to determining disaster risk and the efficacy of actionstaken to manage that risk (high confidence).• Effective disaster risk management will in general require aportfolio of many types of risk reduction, risk transfer, and disastermanagement actions appropriately balanced in terms of resourcesapplied over time (high confidence).45