Perceived Organizational Risks and Reputations Are Related to Individuals Decisions to Eat Genetically Modified Foods

• In Event: 606 - Section on Social Psychology Roundtable Session (co-sponsored with Section on Sociology of Emotions)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 11. Organizational Behavior

Abstract

Recent sociological approaches to risk research have focused on organizations and their reactivity to risk perceptions. Unasked, however, is how individuals’ beliefs, attitudes, and risk perceptions concerning organizations relate to individuals’ own risk-related behaviors. More importantly, do social judgments of organizations continue to influence individuals’ risk-related behaviors even after controlling for perceived organizational risks? This article assesses these questions by testing how individuals’ decisions to engage in risk aversion, operationalized as refusing to eat genetically modified foods (GMOs), are influenced by the perceived organizational risks and reputations of the businesses, medical researchers, and elected officials involved with producing, evaluating, and regulating GMOs. Using data from the 2006 GSS module on science and technology, the author demonstrates how explaining individuals’ decisions to reject GMOs cannot be reduced do a single concept like perceived uncertainty about GMOs’ harms. Instead, social psychological concepts related to legitimacy, reputation, and social influence persist in influencing risk aversion even after organizational risks are controlled.

Author

• Alexander Martin Ruch, University of Iowa