Understanding outrage: how scientists can help bridge the risk perception gap.

The popular press often portrays environmental health risks as scarier than most scientists would portray them. The press tends to present these risks from the general public's perspective. This paper describes a widely used approach to understanding how the views of scientists and the public differ and gives an example of how the gap between these views can be bridged. Because the media's presentation of environmental health issues is key in establishing the terms of public discourse, such an approach can further fruitful dialogue in the policymaking process. The task is to help define a research agenda for protecting children-and thus all of us-from environmental health hazards. Because this agenda will ultimately be some combination of the ideas put forward by scientists, public health officials, and the public, the role of the media is critical in this policy-development process. Reporters are the link between scientists and the public. This paper provides a framework for understanding the ways in which scientists and the public view and define risk. How we all perceive risks is key to decisionmaking about the investment of research funds. Newspapers and magazines, television and radio, and on-line news services and bulletin boards report to us daily about conflicting views between scientists and the public. An example is the series of experiments using radiation that were carried out by various government agencies during the Cold War and announced by Department of Energy Secretary Hazel O'Leary in