#26462
On the morning of 29 August, Hurricane Katrina battered the Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama with winds clocked at 140 miles (225 km) per hour and more than a foot (30 cm) of rain. Although the hurricane spared New Orleans, the major population center of the area, a direct blow, the storm surge caused several of the cityï¿s levees to fail, flooding 80% of the city with up to 20 feet (6 m) of water fouled by sewage, oil, and other pollutants. It will be many years before the coastal areas of southeast Asia and the U.S. Gulf Coast have rebuilt and recovered from this year's disasters. Likewise, it will take time for us to create better disaster plans and disseminate them to the public, and for the value of those plans to be perceived. Neither of these facts makes the rebuilding, recovery, and planning any less necessary. We must do all we can to ensure that they happen as quickly as possible. We should see clearly that we can't afford to do any less.
Hayhoe, George F. Technical Communication Online (2005). Articles>TC>Risk Communication>Southern US
#22246
Siting a Hazardous Waste Facility: The Tangled Web of Risk Communication
Risk communication is a relatively new field of study which has been concerned with the problems arising from the communication of scientific and technical assessments of risk to various sections of the public. These problems have largely been construed as technical ones: how to transfer difficult material from 'experts' to 'people' with the maximum effectiveness and the minimum loss of accuracy and content. Perhaps because technical or practical concerns have dominated, debates which have occurred in the literature of risk analysis have apparently had little impact on the field of risk communication.
Beder, Sharon and Michael Shortland. University of Wollongong (1992). Articles>Risk Communication>Government>Policies and Procedures
#31345
Smoldering Crises: Controlling Risk Through Prevention
The recent Sago Mine and Firestone tire debacles, while different in nature, were both smoldering crises. Good risk management would have likely prevented both from destroying lives, damaging reputations and costing companies millions of dollars. The Institute for Crisis Management (ICM) defines a smoldering crisis as a problem or issue that starts out small and often internally, and that is ignored or not recognized until it blows up into a public crisis.
Smith, Larry. Communication World Bulletin (2006). Articles>Risk Communication
#31725
Streamlining the Phases of Disaster Recovery
All too often, companies either rely upon personal knowledge and skill to recover from emergency situations, or they write a multi-volume encyclopedia of recovery procedures. When disaster strikes, neither approach lends itself to rapid response.
D'Amico, Vin. Writing Assistance (2006). Articles>Management>Planning>Risk Communication
#31312
Taking the Lead in Crisis Planning
If your crisis communication mantra is "What, Me Worry?" you are not alone. In fact, a third of IABC members who took the IABC Research Foundation crisis communication survey last December said they had no formal crisis communication plan in place prior to last year's many natural disasters and organizational crises.
Guthridge, Liz. Communication World Bulletin (2006). Articles>Business Communication>Risk Communication>Crisis Communication
#22281
Testing the Role of Technical Information in Public Risk Perception 
Through experiments with simulated news stories about hazardous materials release, this study finds that providing technical detail about health effects may be less useful than keeping citizens current on the agency's strategies for dealing with problems and other behaviors by officials.
Johnson, Branden B., Peter M. Sandman and Paul Miller. Franklin Pierce Law Center (1992). Articles>Risk Communication>Technical Writing
#13891
In this article, we build on arguments in risk communication that the predominant linear risk communication models are problematic for their failure to consider audience and additional contextual issues. The 'failure' of these risk communication models has led, some scholars argue, to a number of ethical and communicative problems. We seek to extend the critique, arguing that 'risk' is socially constructed. The claim for the social construction of risk has significant implications for both risk communication and the roles of technical communicators in risk situations. We frame these implications as a 'critical rhetoric' of risk communication that (1) dissolves the separation of risk assessment from risk communication to locate epistemology within communicative processes; (2) foregrounds power in risk communication as a way to frame ethical audience involvement; (3) argues for the technical communicator as one possessing the research and writing skills necessary for the complex processes of constructing and communicating risk.
Grabill, Jeffrey T. and W. Michele Simmons. Technical Communication Quarterly (1998). Articles>Communication>Risk Communication
#24585
Toward a Synthesis Model for Crisis Communication in the Public Sector: An Initial Investigation 
This article explores approaches to crisis communication and the application of those approaches by organizations responding to a disaster. The authors conducted a survey of 107 state government agencies to learn about government efforts in situations requiringcrisis communication. Generally, the survey results suggest that although state agenciesenjoy a positive relationship with the media, they have little proactive communicationwith the media, and less than half have a written crisis communication plan. Significantassociations were found between the variables under study, including size of the organization,roles in crisis situations, media relationships, and preparation of a crisis communicationplan. Case studies and additional evaluations of communication resources areneeded to help determine the ability of the public sector to respond effectively to crises.This article considers the needs of state agencies and proposes a conceptual approach thatsynthesizes a crisis communication process designed for the public sector.
Horsley, J. Suzanne and Randolph T. Barker. STC Proceedings (2002). Articles>Risk Communication>Government>Crisis Communication
#21973
Both the Challenger and Three Mile Island disasters involved failures of communication among ordinary professional people, mistakes committed in the course of routine work on the job, small mishaps with grotesque conseqences.
Herndl, Carl G., Barbara A. Fennell and Carolyn R. Miller. WAC Clearinghouse (1991). Articles>Risk Communication>Engineering
#30303
Principles of usability can apply to everything, not just physical objects. When using or creating graphics, documents, symbols or logos, stop and try to think about whether or not the item is usable.
Lanier, Clinton R. sense and usability (2007). Articles>Usability>Technical Illustration>Risk Communication
#19967
Using Web Tools to Communicate about Risks to the Public 
Communicating health, safety, and environmental risks to the public and to the scientific, political, and business communities is a persuasive task as well as an informative one. The job is made easier if the assertions about risk can be backed up with empirical data. But risks are often characterized through the analysis of data sets containing thousands if not millions of measurements. Further, the collection of these data is often conducted by many research teams, and the results often appear in disparate portions of the scientific literature or regulatory reports. On top of all this, environmental, safety, and health data compilations are frequently massive. As a result, finding needed data can be difficult, and understanding it can be bewildering. Web tools are available that synthesize these data and present the information they contain in an organized, understand-able fashion. In doing so, they help risk communicators to focus their writing on a specific topic and to base their assertions on hard facts.
O'Hara, Frederick M., Jr. and Frederick W. Stoss. STC Proceedings (2001). Articles>Risk Communication>Web Design>Writing
#14577
When Is A Warning Adequate? Perspectives From Document Design 
Although safety information is hardly ever read by users of appliances such as hair-dryers warnings must be included in manuals to protect manufacturers from litigation lawsuits. The law stipulates that a warning is adequate when the reasonable user is likely to read it, and when it sufficiently alerts the user both to the nature and degree of the danger. The present study was aimed at examining to what extent regular users of hair-dryers are able to calculate risks that are not explicated in safety instructions; and to determine whether/how users' estimation of the severity of a risk could be paired to the nature of the consequences of non-compliance. As predicted by the researcher the majority of respondents were acquainted with the nature and the level of danger associated with contact between electrical current and water, but were unable to calculate the risks associated with a significant number of other safety instructions. A redesign would, however, require the active involvement of graphic designers, subject experts (electrical engineers and products liability experts) as well as a second round of user-evaluation.
Carstens, Adelia. Universiteit Stellenbosch Taalsentrum (2002). Articles>Documentation>Risk Communication
#10281
This article presents the history of the ANSI standard for preparation of Material Safety Data Sheets, and then provides a section-by-section guide to preparing MSDSs that comply with the standard.
Croft, Suzanne D. Technical Communication Online (1996). Articles>Risk Communication>Standards>Technical Writing
#34279
Decision Analysis and Risk Management: Two Sides of the Same Coin
Every decision involves an analysis of possible future events (costs, outcomes, markets, etc.) and selection of a choice among competing alternatives. Making a decision is making a selection. This white paper will provide you with an outline of how to judge the quality of decisions by exploring how effectively the risks associated with various options have been analyzed.
Egan, Brian Denis. Global Knowledge (2006). Articles>Management>Risk Communication>Business Communication
#34395
Risk Communication and Public Perception of Technological Hazards (Part One)
Research on risk communication relates basic risk perception studies to the formulation of policies, the currently evolving legislation dealing with hazards, the key issues of public involvement, the risk and environmental management. Risk communication is a relatively new field based on a sociological approach. The discipline comes from risk perception studies (psychological approach), which try to investigate how the public is influenced by certain variables in perceiving risk as "acceptable" or not. Risk communication involves some aspects of risk analysis methodology, since it results that also the technical analysis is influenced by the co-operation between the actors involved.
Recchia, Virginia. Social Science Research Network (1999). Articles>Risk Communication>Technology
#35003
This article uses theories of space and findability to analyze a public information center as an example of multi-modal risk communication. The Yucca Mountain Information Center is an informational space created by the Department of Energy to inform the public about the proposed nuclear waste repository planned for Yucca Mountain, Nevada. As a public space, the Center uses fact sheets, posters, and three-dimensional displays to make arguments about the storage of nuclear waste; we argue that the physical space, text, displays, and online space are all elements of risk communication. We offer a new way to read these elements of risk communication and suggest potential opportunities for public agency.
Nagelhout, Ed, Julie Staggers and Denise Tillery. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2009). Articles>Scientific Communication>Risk Communication>Case Studies
#35245
Risk Assessment: Trading Carefully in an Uncertain World
This article reminds us that risk needs to be identified before it can be quantified. It points out that risk models are only as good as the people who devised them and the basic assumption needs to be frequently re-examined.
Rarity, Brian. Business Information Review (2008). Articles>Management>Risk Communication
#35724
Teaching Spokespeople to Manage Risk
There is a significant risk of being quoted out of context during media interviews. This risk can fall anywhere along a spectrum that ranges from mild to severe. Mild risk occurs when the information included in a media story appears to be less than accurate. If you’ve ever heard a spokesperson complain that reporters never get it right, you’ve probably witnessed this type of risk firsthand. Severe risk occurs when a portion of what the spokesperson says is twisted or turned, then included in a story to deliberately fan the flames of a smoldering fire. If this occurs, an organization may need to exercise damage control, and there may be significant risk to its reputation.
Bergman, Eric. Communication World Bulletin (2009). Articles>Education>Public Relations>Risk Communication
