Social construction of risk roles, risk perceptions, and emergency response procedures: An ethnographic case study of two near neighbor chemical manufacturing communities

Social perspectives on risk communication are gaining ground in a field that has been historically dominated by actuarial, economic, and psychological approaches. Through qualitative research methods, the purpose of this study was to examine how residents perceive and socially construct their risk roles related to living near chemical manufacturing facilities, explicating and expanding on taxonomy of risk roles. The study also examined and refined previously identified risk communication process variables and residents' perceptions of community-right-to-know provisions and community emergency response measures. Based on 193 days of observation-participation while living in two communities as part of an ethnographic case study, which included 15 focus groups and 27 in-depth interviews, results of this study suggest that residents perceive their risk roles in more specific categories than previous research identified, and that residents' sense of risk and knowledge of emergency response measures are socially constructed with emphasis on harms and benefits, control, uncertainty, and trust. This study also suggests that sense of risk may increase with the use of sophisticated risk communication campaigns in response to community-right-to-know public policies, elevating the diligence of community residents, and that part of the community's social construction of risk includes justification for living in the community. Also, effective risk communication campaigns were demonstrated to have a positive effect on support for industry. This analysis adds depth to the risk communication literature and suggests that public relations practitioners can and should attempt to understand risk discourse content as well as the communication processes and risk perceptions socially constructed by key publics.