DISTORTIONS IN PERCEPTION OF WARNING SIGNALS ABOUT RISKS AND THREATS TO AN ORGANIZATION

Bogdan Ćwik

ABSTRACT: The main problem of this paper concerns significant distortions in warning signals perception and associated limited effectiveness of warning systems in most monitoring systems and early warning systems of today’s organizations. Particularly important are those distortions that result from various emotional states of a person responsible for perceiving warning signals. Making people responsible for monitoring the risk aware of existing different channels for providing warning information depending on the emotional state of the perceivers, seems to be the solution to this issue. This awareness should enable to significantly improve the perception of risk through simple information activity. The innovation of conducted research and analysis are three models that together represent the basic mechanisms of warning signals perception. Relatively new proposal submitted mainly by researchers of psychological sciences, regarding the fragmentary work on this issue, is to include jointly those three presented models in monitoring systems of risks and threats to an organization. The usefulness of taking into account those proposed models was presented in the course of two empirical studies described in this paper.

Keywords: Signal perception, warning signal, distortion in perception, monitoring of risks and threatens, perception in conditions of anxiety, perception in conditions of fear.