Wearing a Bicycle Helmet Can Increase Risk Taking and Sensation Seeking in Adults.

ABSTRACT: Humans adapt their risk-taking behavior on the basis of perceptions of safety; this risk-compensation phenomenon is typified by people taking increased risks when using protective equipment. Existing studies have looked at people who know they are using safety equipment and have specifically focused on changes in behaviors for which that equipment might reduce risk. Here, we demonstrated that risk taking increases in people who are not explicitly aware they are wearing protective equipment; furthermore, this happens for behaviors that could not be made safer by that equipment. In a controlled study in which a helmet, compared with a baseball cap, was used as the head mount for an eye tracker, participants scored significantly higher on laboratory measures of both risk taking and sensation

SUBMITTER: Gamble T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4767144 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature