Bhuller, Y., et al. (2025).
Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, 105813.
Abstract
Risk assessors, managers, and decision-makers are responsible for evaluating diverse human, environmental, and animal health risks. Although the critical elements of risk assessment and management are well-described in national and international documents, the ethical issues involved in risk decision-making have received comparatively little attention to date. To address this aspect, this article elaborates fundamental ethical principles designed to support fair, balanced, and equitable risk-based decision-making practices. Experts and global thinkers in risk, health, regulatory, and animal sciences were convened to share their lived experiences in relation to the intersection between risk science and analysis, regulatory science, and public health. Through a participatory and knowledge translation approach, an integrated risk decision-making model, with ethical principles and considerations, was developed and applied using diverse, contemporary risk decision-making and regulatory contexts. The ten principles - autonomy, minimize harm, maintain respect and trust, adaptability, reduce disparities, holistic, fair and just, open and transparent, stakeholder engagement, and One Health lens - demonstrate how public sector values and moral norms (i.e., ethics) are relevant to risk decision-making. We also hope these principles and considerations stimulate further discussion, debate, and an increased awareness of the application of ethics in identifying, assessing, and managing health risks.
Here are some thoughts:
This article is critically important for psychologists because it explicitly integrates human values, behavior, and social dynamics into the core of regulatory risk decision-making. While framed for risk assessors and policymakers, the article’s ten ethical principles—such as Autonomy, Minimize Harm, Maintain Respect and Trust, Reduce Disparities, and Stakeholder Engagement—are fundamentally psychological and social constructs. Psychologists possess the expertise to understand how these principles operate in practice: how people perceive and process risk information, how trust is built or eroded through communication, how cognitive biases influence judgment under uncertainty, and how social, cultural, and economic disparities affect vulnerability and resilience. The article’s emphasis on “One Health,” which connects human, animal, and environmental well-being, further demands a systems-thinking approach that psychologists are well-equipped to contribute to, particularly in designing interventions, facilitating stakeholder dialogues, and crafting transparent, culturally appropriate risk communications. By providing a formal ethical framework for decision-making, the article creates a vital bridge for psychologists to apply their science in high-stakes, real-world contexts where human welfare, equity, and ethical conduct are paramount.
