ABSTRACT
In the analysis phase of an assessment, you characterize and quantify the information required to determine the risk, impact, condition, cause, or other assessment result. In frameworks for ecological and human health risk assessment, two types of information are specified for analysis, exposure and effects. If, however, you look at your conceptual model and think about how the world works, you realize that the distinction in the framework is only a convenience. In the real world, one thing causes the next thing, which causes the following thing, etc. Therefore, the effect at one step in a causal process may become the exposure in the next step.
