Cargando…

Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses

Zoonoses represent a global public health threat. Understanding lay perceptions of risk associated with these diseases can better inform proportionate policy interventions that mitigate their current and future impacts. While individual zoonoses (e.g. bovine spongiform encephalopathy) have received...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Spence, Caroline E., Jenkins, Sarah C., Osman, Magda
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9346372/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35920028
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0148
_version_ 1784761635842293760
author Spence, Caroline E.
Jenkins, Sarah C.
Osman, Magda
author_facet Spence, Caroline E.
Jenkins, Sarah C.
Osman, Magda
author_sort Spence, Caroline E.
collection PubMed
description Zoonoses represent a global public health threat. Understanding lay perceptions of risk associated with these diseases can better inform proportionate policy interventions that mitigate their current and future impacts. While individual zoonoses (e.g. bovine spongiform encephalopathy) have received scientific and public attention, we know little about how multiple zoonotic diseases vary relative to each other in lay risk perceptions. To this end, we examined public perceptions of 11 zoonoses across 12 qualitative attributes of risk among the UK public (n = 727, volunteer sample), using an online survey. We found that attribute ratings were predominantly explained via two basic dimensions of risk related to public knowledge and dread. We also show that, despite participants reporting low familiarity with most of the diseases presented, zoonoses were perceived as essentially avoidable. These findings imply that infection is viewed as dependent upon actions under personal control which has significant implications for policy development.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-9346372
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2022
publisher The Royal Society
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-93463722022-08-04 Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses Spence, Caroline E. Jenkins, Sarah C. Osman, Magda Biol Lett Global Change Biology Zoonoses represent a global public health threat. Understanding lay perceptions of risk associated with these diseases can better inform proportionate policy interventions that mitigate their current and future impacts. While individual zoonoses (e.g. bovine spongiform encephalopathy) have received scientific and public attention, we know little about how multiple zoonotic diseases vary relative to each other in lay risk perceptions. To this end, we examined public perceptions of 11 zoonoses across 12 qualitative attributes of risk among the UK public (n = 727, volunteer sample), using an online survey. We found that attribute ratings were predominantly explained via two basic dimensions of risk related to public knowledge and dread. We also show that, despite participants reporting low familiarity with most of the diseases presented, zoonoses were perceived as essentially avoidable. These findings imply that infection is viewed as dependent upon actions under personal control which has significant implications for policy development. The Royal Society 2022-08-03 /pmc/articles/PMC9346372/ /pubmed/35920028 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0148 Text en © 2022 The Authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Global Change Biology
Spence, Caroline E.
Jenkins, Sarah C.
Osman, Magda
Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title_full Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title_fullStr Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title_full_unstemmed Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title_short Impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
title_sort impact of disease characteristics and knowledge on public risk perception of zoonoses
topic Global Change Biology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9346372/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35920028
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0148
work_keys_str_mv AT spencecarolinee impactofdiseasecharacteristicsandknowledgeonpublicriskperceptionofzoonoses
AT jenkinssarahc impactofdiseasecharacteristicsandknowledgeonpublicriskperceptionofzoonoses
AT osmanmagda impactofdiseasecharacteristicsandknowledgeonpublicriskperceptionofzoonoses