Risk Assessment of Radio Frequencies and Public Information

Abstract

The rapid, worldwide development of mobile phones is accompanied in many countries by public concern over the possible health risks of radio frequencies (RF). National and international health agencies have undertaken risk assessments, and an in-depth study was recently conducted with the French Agency on Environment and Health Safety (AFSSET). This paper builds upon this experience, considering not only risk assessment as it bears upon a physical object (RF), but also concerning activities largely characterized along psychosocial dimensions (mobile phone use). It becomes a theoretical and methodological challenge, however, to integrate these characteristics into the assessment process. The research of causal links between RF exposure and subsequent biological or health effects is the main focus of expology. Applied in the AFSSET assessment, the results are in line with previous reviews of research: biological response appears nonexistent or limited to a few cases, and there is no evidence of RF health effects. Considering these results, we specifically look at how information may play a role in the construction of the psychological and social relationship to risk, with a particular emphasis on potential health impacts. In that context, we explore the lesser-known notion of socio-cognitive exposure, char acterized by chronic exposure of populations to potentially worrying information when various health consequences are evoked in the literature and by the media. Th is raises the possibility of a link between risk information and health. Several specific explanations are explored here, notably: nocebo, stress, and the symmetry rule.