Bears are much scarier than cars. You will pass hundreds of cars, if you drive through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. You may see a bear, but you very well may not. I could only find one instance of a bear killing a person in the GSMNP (on May 21, 2000). However, in 2019, Nine people were killed in car wrecks in the GSMNP.
Some things are scary that will not harm us. Some things will harm us that are not scary. Actual rather than perceived risks to life and health are what we should be most concerned about. So, how do we get past what is scary but what is not risky? How do we learn to take precautions when things are risky but not scary? In other words, how can we be sure that we are doing the right things to keep us safe and healthy? That’s what David Ropeik’s book, How Risky Is It, Really? Why Our Fears Don’t Always Match the Facts is all about (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010).
What Ropeik does is try to help us see what makes things feel risky or scary to us. Then, he provides advice on how to get better at evaluating actual risk.
Ropeik suggests that there are eleven things that make people, situations, or things more scary.
- Trust. When trust is low, fear is higher. For example, if we don’t trust our government, what they tell us to do feels scarier, even if it is not. The converse is also true as well.
- Loss. This is complicated, but if the potential loss is great, then it feels scarier, even if it is not a great risk. Losing a house to a tornado feels scarier than having credit cards, even though the latter is more likely to bring you to financial ruin.
- Control. If we feel in control, we feel safe. Airplanes are much safer than automobiles. However, in an automobile, we feel more in control.
- Choice. If we have a choice, we feel less afraid. Ropeik explains that Finland allowed communities to choose whether they would have a nuclear power plant. This ability to choose caused much less fear in those towns than is commonly seen in these issues.
- Human-made is scarier than natural. Man-made vaccines feel scarier than natural herd immunity, even though the former may actually be safer and cause less harm.
- Pain and suffering. If it will cause a lot of pain, it’s scarier. A sight of someone suffering from a rare disease makes it feel scarier, even if it is unlikely that we will ever get that disease.
- Catastrophic is scarier than chronic. 132 suicides a day isn’t as scary as 20,000 people dying from a tsunami in a matter of minutes.
- Can it happen to me? If we feel it can happen to us, then we are more scared. Ropeik demonstrates, for example, that while many people are concerned about climate change, they rarely consider it a high concern. One reason for this, Ropeik suggests, is that very few people think (according to the surveys) that it will have much effect on them.
- Is the risk new or familiar? Automobile accidents and heart disease are familiar causes of death. A sniper in your community is extraordinary. Even if the risk of the former two is much higher, the other feels much scarier.
- Does it effect children? If it has an effect on children, then it feels much scarier. All mass shootings are tragic, but school shootings effect us in ways that the others do not.
- Personification. If we know someone who has experienced it, then it becomes much scarier.
Important qualification. He notes risk is not the only factor. He just wants us to measure the risk properly. We could also add that mere death, illness, or loss is not the only risk. We also have to look at other issues. For example, having our schools be safe has value beyond preservation of the specific lives, which is also important. At the same time, not communicating excessive fear is also important. This requires careful calibration and debate. Whatever we decide, it’s best to be self-conscious about the things that make us feel scared. Then, we can act more deliberately rather than merely reacting.
So, how do we get there? How do we learn to see the real risk? Ropeik has detailed suggestions on how to do that. Here’s what he proposes.
- Keep an open mind. Recognize that our brain often makes mistakes. Be willing to see that and be open to hearing different perspectives and looking more deeply into things.
- Give yourself more time. Sometimes we have to make a quick decision, but oftentimes we don’t. We can often take time to evaluate potential threats.
- Get more information. Don’t just go with intuition. Try to read up on a subject and listen to various sides of it.
- Get information from trusted sources. If someone points you to a study that says something is safe, it’s better if it didn’t come from the company selling the product. Listen to those who’ve studied things in detail without taking their word as absolute. Pay special attention to those who have the least personal stake in the issue.
- Ask how hazardous it is. That’s not enough. Ropeik says, “Even if something is hazardous, you have to know how hazardous. And hazardous to whom? And hazardous at what levels? And, of course, hazardous in what ways?” (emphasis his, 221).
- Ask about exposure, how much of something that is hazardous do you have experience before it is really harmful? “How much exposure is hazardous? Over what period of time? At what age? By what routes might I be exposed?” (emphasis his, 221).
- Clarify the numbers. Half of marriages end in divorce, but only one third of first time marriages end in divorce. You’ve got to ask more questions of the numbers.
- Think about tradeoffs. You can’t just look at how dangerous something is. You’ve got to compare it to other things. If you avoid the danger of flying, then you may have to drive. Your odds of dying in a car accident are greater than your odds of dying in an airplane accident.
- Think for yourself, but watch for confirmation bias. In other words, listen to authorities, but evaluate their arguments. Watch out in thinking for yourself that you don’t simply read those things that agree with your perspective. That’s our human tendency to confirmation bias, and it easily blinds us to reality.
- Watch out for things you take for granted. Every person and every group has blind spots. We all tend to look at only our perspective. When you begin to come to a conclusion, be sure to read the other side sympathetically.
- Be a smarter news consumer. We purchase news that is sensational and focuses on scary things. “If it scares, it airs” (175). News is what it is because we are what we are. When you read the news, recognize that. “Just keep in mind that the news media tend to make things sound more dramatic than they are, not by lying or making things up, but in subtle ways” (226). Good news doesn’t sell, but it may be out there.
- Think about how you think. Understand the emotional factors involved in your thinking. Recognize that we all have biases that we have to overcome. Be more self-conscious about how you come to conclusions.
As I’ve reflected on this book, I’ve been amazed at how many times I’ve simply digested things that I don’t have any real evidence for. Of course, we have to make quick decisions sometimes, but I shouldn’t just rest satisfied with that. My goal is to act more out of reality rather than things that seemed right or felt right to me through the years. This is a difficult and challenging process. Ropeik’s book offers many helpful insights for me on that journey.
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Bear Photo by Sebastian Scheuer on Unsplash
Mountain Climbing Photo by Maja Kochanowska on Unsplash