Noxious Chemical Exposure Trends as Measures of Green Victimization: Public Health, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey Trends, and Green Criminology

Abstract

Green criminologists have argued that exposure to environmental pollution constitutes a serious form of green victimization of the general public and public health. This claim has not been widely assessed empirically. The present study employs data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) over time to examine trends in exposure to environmental toxins among the U.S. population. NHANES data allow such an assessment through the collection of biological sampling used to determine exposure to environmental toxins. We examined trends for NHANES exposure estimates for biological indicators of pollutant exposure over time for 64 chemicals that have multiple measures. We divide the exposure trends into declining, stable, increasing, and unclear trajectory patterns and discuss the health consequences associated with exposure to measured chemical exposures. Discussion of the implications of this analysis and the need for future studies is provided.

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Notes on contributors

Michael J. Lynch

Michael J. Lynch is professor of criminology, University of South Florida. He introduced the concept of green criminology into the literature and has researched that subject, radical criminology, environmental justice, corporate crime and its control, and environmental sociological issues for three decades. He is the recipient of lifetime achievement awards from the Division on Critical Criminology & Social Justice and the Division on White Collar & Corporate Crime of the American Society of Criminology. His most recent books include Green Criminology (University of California Press, 2017), Quantitative Studies in Green and Conservation Criminology (Routledge, 2019), and Green Criminology and Green Theories of Justice: An Introduction to a Political Economic View of Eco-Justice (Palgrave, 2020).

Hyojong Song

Hyojong Song is an assistant professor of criminology at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. His areas of research interest include environmental crime and justice, technology and deviance, theories of crime and deviance, and research methods and statistics. His work has appeared in publications such as Crime & Delinquency, Critical Criminology, and the American Journal of Criminal Justice.