The ''psychometric paradigm'' developed by Slovic, Fischhoff, and Lich
tenstein was a landmark in research about public attitudes toward risk
s. One problem with this work, however, was that (at least initially)
it did not attempt to distinguish between individuals or groups of peo
ple, except ''experts'' vs. ''lay people.'' This paradigm produced a '
'cognitive map'' of hazards, and the assumption seemed to be that the
characteristics identified were inherent attributes of risk. This pape
r examines the validity of this assumption. A questionnaire survey sim
ilar to those designed by Slovic et al. was conducted, but the data we
re analyzed at both the aggregate level, using mean scores, and at the
level of individuals (N = 131 Norwich residents). The results reporte
d here demonstrate that (1) individuals vary in their perception of th
e same risk issue; (2) individuals vary in their rating of the same ri
sk characteristics on the same risk issue; and (3) some of the strong
intercorrelations observed between risk characteristics at the aggrega
te level are not supported when the same data are analysed at the leve
l of individuals. Despite these findings, the relationship between ris
k characteristics and risk perceptions inferred by the psychometric pa
radigm did hold true at the level of individuals, for most-but not all
-of the characteristics. In particular, the relationship between ''lac
k of knowledge to those exposed'' and risk perceptions appears to be a
complex one, a finding which has important implications for risk comm
unication strategies.