If I lived in a new suburban community and over the course of several years started to notice a pattern of illnesses among my neighbors; children and adults alike, I would definitely start to become suspicious and concerned that these issues are not related to genetics. My attention would then shift to the common link that we share, which would be the community that we live in. Next, I would consider what elements are shared among the community that could be causing people to develop similar health problems. Which would then prompt me to start asking myself a slew of questions, like could it be the water we drink, the ground the homes were developed on, the materials used to construct the homes, were all the proper tests and precautions related to the environment taken during construction?; just to name a few. With all of these questions, I would need to find out who to get the answers from. The first people I would contact are the builders. I don’t think I would mention anything about illnesses though at this point; fearing that they would be reluctant to discuss things with me if they thought they there could be a law suit. I would then ask questions about the history of the property and try to find out the names of the various contractors they used to plan and execute the construction of the community to continue in my search for answers. To confirm the things I learned from them I would also conduct research on the internet, and also see what other questions I could answer. I would research the builder’s history to see if they have had similar cases or complaints of illness in other communities.
I would also attempt to discuss my theories and concerns with my neighbors and gather more information about their illnesses. I have to remember to be sensitive to what my neighbors are going through and I also cannot assume that they will want to discuss such personal issues or even want to assist in opening a can of worms in trying to find out if the problems could be related to construction of our homes. This step could be tricky in