Thursday, November 12, 2009

Living Well

5 Ways to Size Up a Health Risk

Posted March 7, 2008

Reader Comments

Risk and Knowledge

Your third point, regarding risk in relation to control, requires a corollary. People feel much more confident if they are well informed about the workings of a particular procedure or technology. Often this leads them to believe that, since they have a clear understanding of the process, the risk is reduced. The inverse also applies, the less one knows about a given procedure the more likely they are to over estimate the risk. As Alfred Hitchcock well knew, we fear that which we cannot see.

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