Theoretical Aspects of Risk Perception
Risk perception is the subjective judgment that people make about the characteristics and severity of a risk with reference to health.
Three major theories developed in its approach:-
1. Psychology approaches (heuristics and cognitive)
- heuristic means enabling a person to discover or learn something for themselves;
- this approach is related to positive and negative emotion.
2. Anthropology / sociology approaches (cultural theory)
- based on ways of life including hierarchical, individualist, egalitarian, and fatalist.
3. Interdisciplinary approaches (social amplification of risk framework)
- outlines how communication of risk events passes from the sender through intermediate stations to a receiver and in the process serves to amplify or attenuate perceptions of risk.
