Advancing Understanding of Knowledge’s Role in Lay Perception B.B. Johnson

Thomas Jasen Gardner

LSC  515

Public Information Campaign

Week 9

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Advancing Understanding of Knowledge’s Role in Lay Perception

B.B. Johnson

            When does knowledge initiate behavior change?  This article deals with how lay people and experts adopt knowledge, and how they use they knowledge to enact changes in their risk perception.

            It is quite obvious that WDNR has different perceptions of AIS then anglers.

WDNR experts have taken the scientific data and made conclusions that are inconclusive to some anglers. The seriousness of the risk perceptions that WDNR uses to support behavior changes presents uncertainty for anglers.

            The differences in discovery of this hazard knowledge, and justification for applying that knowledge is how the information is processed. An angler’s attitude about the source of the knowledge may hinder a positive response. His/her conceptual framework may place government and industry as having ulterior motives for insisting on behavior changes. It is particular difficult to initiate change in a subject that will not trust information from an untrustworthy source. WDNR must have had a prior subjective framework of having aims that conflicted with the attitude of anglers.

            Nonetheless, laypeople and experts disagree on the high-probability of AIS contamination because there no mental model exists that identifies how it applies to humans. The selfishness of ignorance does not identify hazard concepts that personally affect an angler’s sense of self-importance.  Information from WDNR officials is so haphazard those fishermen don’t believe their personal efforts would make a difference.  If science had validated its findings, government would have a sterner response. It seems WDNR is making feeble attempts to change angler’s behavior without making attempts to change the behavior of other variables.

            Anglers perceive that this hazard lies outside their control, because opinion leaders they trust and respect have not agreed about the facts of the conflict. The communication process is incomplete without politicians making laws and authorities enforcing those laws. Without those laws to contradict the theory that AIS presence is creationist apathy, individual anglers will continue to spread AIS.

            The hypothetical model of dead lakes with no native fish is so politicalized that events are rarely publicized. Lake pollution signifies jobs with industries that advertise. Neither is the media repetitive with conceptual knowledge about these events. So there is no direct or indirect experience for dreading risk probabilities of AIS. This current ideology is resists change by avoiding the social context of AIS.

            This lack of communal support maybe because the community lacks the communication resources to give credible advice. This wedge allows WDNR wisdom to be questioned in a laypersons media framework.  Information processing must include the communication heuristics of anglers who distort or do not process complex information correctly. Each day a new AIS threat emerges.