Knowledge communication in internet age and its impacts on public perception of nuclear risk

Abstract

The public perception of nuclear risk can sensibly sway political decision and policy making related to nuclear energy. Knowledge is generally considered as an important variable to change public perception, so to promote knowledge communication is a rational choice for all stakeholders in the political game. The era of internet knowledge communication is marked by the emergence of three models, namely network community, media convergence and cloud computing. By mapping of relations between these three models of communication and three versions of nuclear knowledge communicated by pro-nuclear, anti-nuclear and scientific stakeholders, some significant correlations can be identified: network community contributes to further self-organisation of anti-nuclear individuals; media convergence helps to optimise the communication efficiency of pro-nuclear groups; cloud computing facilitates the communication of scientific nuclear knowledge.