Final Program - Society for Risk Analysis

P.88 Johnson BB, Cuite C, Hallman W; branden@decisionresearch.orgDecision Research, Rutgers UniversityTRUST AND RESPONSIBILITY ATTRIBUTIONS: VARIATIONSACROSS HAZARD MANAGERS IN ACCIDENTAL AND INTENTION-AL FOOD CONTAMINATION INCIDENTSSources of trust in hazard managers have been studied in detail over manyyears, but reasons for attributing responsibility for hazard system performance havenot. This study examines the role of factors in the salient value similarity (SVS) andintuitive detection theorists (IDT) models of trust, as well as awareness of problemsand freedom to act to deal with those problems (AWFR), in predicting both trust andattributions of responsibility. The context used is a hypothetical contamination offood by Salmonella bacteria, either accidental or intentional, and these judgments areassessed for food producers, processors, “watchdogs” (government), sellers, preparers,and consumers. Results show that trust is primarily positively predicted by an indexcombining SVS and IDT items, with AWFR playing a trivial role of varying sign.However, initial attributions of responsibility are positively predicted by AWFR, withSVS/IDT as a secondary and largely negative predictor. These relative roles persist inlogistic regressions of final attributions of responsibility, which control for the initialattributions. Modest differences occur across hazard managers and contaminationcause in both trust and responsibility attributions, but these do not affect the relativeinfluence of SVS, IDT and AWFR variables.P.87 Jordan LA, Swain KA; lajordan@olemiss.eduUniversity of MississippiBP’S USE OF TWITTER AS A CRISIS COMMUNICATION TOOL DUR-ING THE GULF OF MEXICO OIL SPILL RESPONSE PHASEOn April 20, 2010, British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in theGulf of Mexico exploded, creating the largest oil spill in U.S. history. BP launched amajor public relations response targeting BP’s online audiences through strategic useof its corporate website, Twitter feed, Facebook page, YouTube channel and Flickrphotostream. This content analysis examines BP’s use of Twitter during the crisisresponse phase of the oil spill. All 1,161 of BP’s tweets from the 14-week period,from the time of the explosion to the capping of the well, were analyzed. The tweetsreflected reputation repair strategies, responsibility attributions, and public risk perceptionsduring different emergency management phases. Reputation repair strategieswere reflected in 29 percent of the tweets, with the strategies of “compensation”and “reminder” appearing most often. About 97 percent of the tweets indicated anaccident crisis, and 90 percent reflected a high level of crisis responsibility. Public riskperceptions were implied in 72 percent of the tweets. The most common perceptionwas that the oil spill response had strong political attributes tied to it.W3-G.4 Julias C, Liu C, Luke N; juliasc@cdm.comCDMPOLYCYCLIC AROMATIC HYDROCARBONS ANALYSIS USINGCHEMICAL MASS BALANCE MODELPolycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are ubiquitous organic chemicals thatpersist in the environment. PAHs are formed through an incomplete combustionof most organic material and also occur naturally at low levels in crude oil and coal.Elevated concentrations of PAHs were found in residential areas near an inactivechemical facility. The Chemical Mass Balance model (CMB-8.2) developed by EPA isused to identify the source(s) of anthropogenic PAH contamination in the residentialareas. CMB is a fundamental receptor model based on the use of the mass balanceconcept. Twelve parent PAHs are used in CMB to generate PAH source profilesbecause they are frequently detected in soil samples and are included in many sourceprofiles available in the literature. CMB consists of a least squares solution to a setof linear equations which expresses each receptor concentration of a chemical speciesas a linear sum of products of source profile species and source contributions.The model assumes that: (1) the composition of each source emission is consistentover the period represented by receptor data, (2) chemical species do not react witheach other or with the environment, (3) all sources that contribute significantly to thereceptor have been identified and their chemical profile is known, (4) the compositionof each source is linearly independent of other sources, and (5) measurement uncertaintiesare random, uncorrelated, and normally distributed. CMB attempts to derivesource profiles from the covariation in space and/or time of many different samplesof atmospheric constituents that originate in different sources. These profiles arethen used in CMB to quantify source contributions to each ambient sample. As aresult, CMB is used to determine whether historical processes at the chemical facilitythat may relate to the deposition of contaminants in the residential areas.P.69 Jung J, Song Y, Kim S; seoyongkim@ajou.ac.krChungju National UniversityVARIETIES OF EMOTIONAL JUDGEMENT AND ITS DETERMI-NANTS IN CASE OF THE NUCLEAR POWERIn our study, we analyze the structure and determinants of emotional judgmentabout nuclear power. A lot of previous studies have found that emotion is one ofimportant factors in judging the nuclear power acceptance. There are great dividesbetween rational thinking and irrational thinking in judging risk objects; the formerstresses perceived benefit/risk’s role in judgment and the latter focuses on the feelingand stigma reflecting image of risk. We will specify the emotional thinking in caseof judging the nuclear power. At first, to test the causal factor to bring out emotionalthinking, we will analyze how the emotional judgment occurs according to demographicvariables. We prove the previous study’s main results that the younger, more125