Risk Communication and Miscommunication: Case Studies in Science, Technology, Engineering, Government, and Community Organizations

✍ Scribed by Carolyn Boiarsky

• Publisher: University Press of Colorado
• Year: 2016
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 193
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Effective communication can help prevent or minimize damage from environmental disasters. In Risk Communication and Miscommunication, Carolyn Boiarsky teaches students, technical writers, public affairs officers, engineers, scientists, and governmental officials the writing and communication skills necessary for dealing with environmental and technological problems that could lead to major crises. Drawing from research in rhetoric, linguistics, technical communication, educational psychology, and web design, Boiarsky provides a new way to look at risk communication. She shows how failing to consider the readers’ needs and the rhetorical context in which a document is read can be catastrophic and how anticipating those needs can enhance effectiveness and prevent disaster. She examines the communications and miscommunications of original e-mails, memos, and presentations about various environmental disasters, including the Columbia space shuttle breakup and the BP/Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion, and successes, such as the Enbridge pipeline expansion and the opening of the Mississippi Spillway, offering recommendations for effective communication. Taking into account the growing need to communicate complex and often controversial issues across vast geographic and cultural spaces with an ever-expanding array of electronic media, Risk Communication and Miscommunication provides strategies for clear communication of data, ideas, and procedures to varied audiences to prevent or minimize damage from environmental incidents.

✦ Table of Contents

Title Page
Copyright
Contents
Acknowledgments
How to Read This Book
Introduction
Background
Chapter 1. Writing and Reading in the Context of the Environmental Sciences: A Case Study of the Chicago Flood
Introduction
The Chicago Flood
Reading Koncza’s Memo
Knowledge of the Topic Affects the Reader’s Comprehension of the Message
Recognizing the Purpose of a Message Affects the Reader’s Response to a Message
The Context in Which a Reader Reads a Document Affects the Reader’s Interpretation of the Message
Readers’ Reading Styles and Patterns Determine the Information Readers Obtain
Writing a More Effective Memorandum
Summary: What Readers Do
Chapter 2. Effective Discourse Strategies: A Case Study of the 2011 Mississippi Flood
Introduction
The 2011 Mississippi Flood
Writing the Corps’s Letters: Making Appropriate Rhetorical Decisions
Focusing on the Readers’ as Well as the Writers’ Purposes
Providing Content Readers Want and Need
Organizing Information to Facilitate Readers’ Comprehension
Helping Readers Read Fluently
Summary
Chapter 3. Effective Persuasive Strategies: Cheap, Available Coal Power vs. a Clean Environment
Introduction
Continued Use of Coal as a Source of Energy
Recognizing Readers’ Biases
Reflecting Readers’ Attitudes
Reflecting Readers’ Concept of Valid Evidence
Helping Readers Follow a Line of Reasoning
Review
Chapter 4. Communicating with Electronic Media: Case Studies in the Columbia Shuttle Breakup and the BP/Horizon Oil Rig Explosion
Communicating via Electronic Media
Reading on Electronic Media
Columbia Shuttle Accident
Writing for Electronic Media
The BP/Horizon Gulf Oil Rig Explosion
Problems in Communicating with Electronic Media
1. Transfer of the Conventions and Style of Social Media to Technical/Scientific Correspondence
2. Transfer of the Functions of the Telephone to E-mail and Text Messages
3. Sole Reliance on Electronic Media to Discuss Complex Messages
4. Failure to Read, Reflect on, and Revise a Draft
Conclusion
Recommendations for Writing Effective Electronic Messages
Chapter 5. Communicating with PowerPoint: The Army, NASA, and the Enbridge Pipeline
PowerPoint and the Army
Inappropriate Rhetorical Decisions
Columbia Shuttle Breakup
Inappropriate Graphical Decisions
Synergistic Effects
Differentiating Effects between Textual and Graphical Slides
Effects of a Slide Deck
Effects of Handouts and Note-Taking
Improving Presentations
Changing Perspective
Reducing Synergistic Effects
Guidelines
Slides
Slides with graphics
Slides with textual content only
Handouts and Note-Taking
An Effective Slideware Presentation Mixing Graphics and Text: Expansion of the Enbridge Pipeline30
Example of a Presentation with Text-Based Slideware
Bibliography
Websites with Background and Additional Information
Index