SCIENCE

What Changed? Looking at Risks in the 21st Century

Sat Feb 08 2025
What do people think about risks today? People have looked at how people see risks of things like nuclear power but what hasn't been looked at is newer things. Newer risks are examined like climate change and fake news. This is to compare with older risks. A large group of people online were asked to look at risks and to compare. These types of data could have various levels of accuracy and openness. Some people have taken various perspectives on different things. People think climate change andfake news are important. People rated benefits and risks from many different activities that people do. This information will compare to other research before about risks. People now think of benefits and risks together. This was done online with a lot of people. A lot of people were asked about risks of things. A counter-intuitive thing was found - people who see benefits in these risky activities tend to see less risk. It mirrored the results from 2016. Which can dispel the idea of risk always being an absolute. Perhaps people tend to be more careful in their own perceptions rather than a fixed idea. People tend to avoid new and scary risks. We see that new risks are scary because they are unknown. . Something newer might be scary like nuclear energy. So it is a little less scary to look at new risks. There are invariably surprises Online research like this can find out more about how people think about risks. People can think of different things to rate them accordingly. This way, a risk may be mitigated easily through more awareness. People might get more open mind about a large number of risks. It might be better to think of it as an activity not as a risk. Instead of looking at a thing that is potentially dangerous, it would be better to look at the thing and its worth. A lot of people were asked to compare risky activities to benefits and risks. This showed that risks were looked at differently. What is scary or unknown is something to think about. When someone says something is a risk, some people will think about it differently - like "oh it's not so scary as it sounds. " People are becoming more used to new risks. People tend to think about risks and benefits at the same time. Each person thought about risks in a unique way. We don't have a standard answer to this. People might think of risks differently. This can change from day to day. Their thoughts about risks change. People who see benefits in something tend to see less risk.

questions

    How do variations in individual perceptions of benefits and risks impact the overall risk assessment for technologies?
    What biases might be present in the online data collection process that could affect the reliability of the study's findings?
    If you could rate the risk of 'fake news on the internet', would you be more scared of the information or of the weird ads popping up?

actions