This thesis deals with the communication of cancer risk in genetic counselling sessions. There are two primary foci that form threads throughout both the theoretical and empirical chapters of the dissertation. The first concerns the meaning of risk as it manifests in familial cancer. In particular, there is a lack of a sound theoretical grounding for the probabilistic aspect of risk that is evident in many forms of risk communication. The thesis aims to illustrate the problem constituted by this lack of theoretical clarity. As most decisions faced by clients arise from attending genetic counselling, it is concluded that clients ' agency is highly constrained when genetic counselling is understood as a process of assisting decision - making. However, genetic counselling can be seen to enable agency when it is conceptualised as a process aimed at making available new medical technologies for the purpose of addressing clients ' own concerns. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Faculty of Health Sciences, Dept. of Psychology, 2005.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/263656 |
| Date | January 2005 |
| Creators | O'Doherty, Kieran Christian |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
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