The industrial hygiene profession has changed dramatically through the years, and the trends are familiar to those who have been practicing as long as Boelter. Industrial hygienists have worked continuously to improve upon the means and methods of characterizing exposures. In many industries, exposures have been reduced significantly. The nature of the workplace itself has changed: what it means to be an employee is different now, and in some ways more complicated given the increase in temporary and contracting work. And conditions that would likely be considered gross by today’s standards may have been compliant back when Boelter’s career began. “The expectations on the part of workers and on the part of the public are different today than they were 40-plus years ago, or even when AIHA was founded 75 years ago,” Boelter says. “And therefore what is considered acceptable has also changed.” “If we are professionally grounded in the historic concept of evaluating exposures, and if we are accustomed to comparing exposures against some allowable level of exposure, then is what we consider an allowable level today going to stand the test of time into the future?” Boelter asks. The idea of “acceptable” is a personal observation made by the individual, so while science and policy have helped create allowable limits and recognized standards to define what is acceptable, individuals’ perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs may or may not align with those definitions. And as industrial hygienists collect more and more information related to the totality of human environmental exposures—the exposome—they must figure out how to use that information to make sense of what is meant by acceptable, Boelter notes. The general public’s distrust of science heightens the challenge that industrial hygienists face in trying to effectively communicate to people what complex information means and why some level of exposure must be acceptable. When there’s no definition for “acceptable” chemical, physical, or biological exposure, it’s easy to conclude that any exposure is unacceptable. “To call everything bad is to call nothing bad, and that makes no sense in the real world,” Boelter says. “We are ultimately talking about humans, how humans think, and the basis upon which people make decisions about risk. Humans don’t think in technical terms, and yet technical is our professional domain, and we’re very comfortable and skilled with the technical work that we do.” MOTIVATION WITHOUT FEAR Boelter’s interest in risk has prompted him to move away from technical committee work—developing new methods or developing allowable limits, for example—and into behavioral matters, such as how to help people make informed decisions. He’s focused on developing more effective means for industrial hygienists to convey information so people can understand the risks involved in involuntary activities, such as in the workplace, and make informed decisions about personal, voluntary activities. Until recently, Boelter argues, industrial hygienists have relied on fear and raw data, presented without explanation to help the public make sense of it, to help people understand risk. “Much of the literature and many agency policy decisions are fear-based or couched as ‘no known safe level of exposure,’ and I don’t feel—professionally—we should use fear as a tool to get people to change their behaviors,” Boelter says. “While response to fear is hard-wired into our species and can be a great motivator, exposure science requires understanding hazards and making behavioral risk management changes to affect what is called being safe. Our profession, after all, is finding safe ways for people to work with hazards.” Boelter believes that there’s more than ample room for additional work on this broader topic of risk, which he acknowledges may be a bit ‘uncomfortable’ for industrial hygienists. “We’re not talking technical when we’re talking about human behaviors,” he says. “We are comfortable with technical, we are comfortable with numbers, and we would like more people to occupy the scientific and engineering space, but that’s not how humans think and it’s really not how humans make decisions. If a person feels safe, they are safe by their own measure. We want workers to understand and trust the science of health and safety so that we can model, measure, and confirm that they are safe.” THE RISK-REWARD RATIO Boelter has always been interested in what he recognizes as a risk-reward ratio—what others may call cost-benefit. He learned early on from his father, an entrepreneur with his own plumbing and heating business, that without risk, there is little potential for reward, and that humans are unable to advance without building on others’ previous experiences. That idea holds true not only in terms of how people succeed personally and in business, but also in the world of occupational health. “This risk-reward, cost-benefit relationship is one that is deeply ingrained in engineering, and it’s deeply ingrained in our profession in terms of protecting worker health and safety,” Boelter says. The question becomes “what is the reward associated with taking an occupational risk, or what benefit results to the employee as a result of the employer reducing risk?” Boelter praises industrial hygienists’ “marvelous capability” in the technical realm, which they can integrate into how decisions get made, both by businesses and enterprise risk management as well as by individuals. But that’s not easy given the public’s current attitude toward exposure. “Let’s not forget that we have helped the worker and the public, either consciously or unwittingly, to believe the idea that exposure is not good,” Boelter says. “With OELs and guidelines, we are at the same time trying to explain to workers and the public why a certain level of exposure is not bad. “People will say, ‘I don’t want any exposure,’ without realizing that there is no such thing as zero exposure. Therefore, there must be some level of exposure which is not unacceptable. Yet I don’t think we’re very good at explaining that concept to people.” For Boelter, enhancing the profession’s visibility and strengthening its relationship with the public are the first steps in helping people understand how industrial hygiene has improved health and safety, both occupationally and non-occupationally. “It is the nontechnical side of our work that I see to be of greatest importance for us to be focusing on professionally,” Boelter says. “We have this intersection between the scientific work that we do and the challenge of trying to communicate many of these difficult scientific concepts without confusing the public—at the same time, focusing on why the public should care about health and safety.”