Viewpoint

Chemophobia

We are all too familiar with the food and environment hysteria which has become so popular. Traces of pesticides in our food are purportedly poisoning us in ways hitherto unknown to science. If we survive our food, we will be blasted with life-killing ultraviolet from the ozone hole, unless we are lucky enough to be drowned first by the rising seas.

My impression is that the same segment of the population that worries about "chemicals" in their food is also involved in a wide range of anti-science and anti-technology causes. Certainly there is great innumeracy in the movement -- traces of chemicals at 10 parts per trillion are given just as much attention as fish-killing waste spills into waterways.

Why does this mind-set have such enormous popular appeal? Are sensationalist media articles responsible? Or is there something in the public psyche that laps up these fantasies of environmental disaster?

I want to suggest a transactional analysis model of the phenomenon. It could provide one possible conceptual framework for analysing this behaviour. A basic concept of transactional analysis is the existence in everyone of three personality components or states -- the Parent, the Child and the Adult. We move back and forth between these states according to internal and external stimuli.

It's easy to flip into a non-Adult state. For instance, during an argument, one or both people can assume the role of the dour, disapproving Parent, while the other becomes the hurt, non-rational Child.

The Parent and Child states are useful, productive members of the triumvirate. The Child can contribute joy, enthusiasm and inventiveness. The Parent provides automatic response to routines (remotely akin to the superego of the Freudians). The Adult is the mature, logical component. I think the chemophobia attitude "hooks" the Child state. Consider a typical anti-chemical scenario:

The wicked multinational chemical manufacturer lurks in the background, anxious to spray poisons over the twittering green landscape. His dupe is the farmer (in the Disney version, Goofy would play this role). There are invisible hazards, completely undetectable except by magical equipment operated by friendly wizards. Paradoxically, as the detection devices (such as spectrometers and chromatographs) become more sensitive, the more toxic and dangerous the chemical is seen to be. Thus, if you can detect dioxin at 1 part per trillion, this is taken to "prove" that dioxin must be unbelievably toxic!

Opposed to all of these is wise old Mother Nature. If we would only obey Mother's wishes, all would be well. Only boffins think that herbs developed chemicals for the benefit of the herb. The Child knows that they were put there for the benefit of humans. Indeed, the natural world is there purely for humanity to use or to protect -- both attitudes are arrogant.

Naturally occurring substances are seen as absolutely harmless and only manmade things are risky. Pure synthetic pharmaceuticals are as naught compared to the quasi-random mixtures of herbs. Small amounts of well-protected radioactives in smoke detectors are dangerous. Much larger doses of "natural" radiation from the potassium in our own bodies are quite all right.

This emphasis on "natural equals good" is one of the most characteristic aspects of the movement. Marketers have picked this up. They advertise "natural" vegetables filled with far more natural carcinogens and teratogens than any agricultural spray could ever leave. The environment or food must be made absolutely safe, with no place for uncertainty or quantitative evaluation of relative risks.

If my interpretation of the anti-science phenomenon is even partially correct, it has implications for how scientists should talk to the public. There's no point in presenting logical quantitative expositions aimed at the Adult when the public is in the fearful Child state.

The public expresses fear. The scientists and relevant organisations provide facts that don't satisfy the real needs of the public. In a further effort to alleviate public anxieties, chemical monitoring is expanded and stricter regulations enforced. A vicious circle is started, for this now "proves" that there is a danger.

Is it possible to shift the worried public to its Adult state? Perhaps we need a surrogate maternal Parent -- a charismatic, warm-hearted PhD who can provide reassurance in an authoritative manner.

Possibly, scientists trying to get public support for scientific research should not talk about cost-effectiveness. Instead we should describe the excitement of research or the pleasures of exploring new concepts. If the delight in exploratory science is a function of our Child's joy in finding out or doing new things, why not let the Child nature of others share in the fun?

Dr Jay Mann is a plant biochemist.