Reported Risk Behaviors and Perceived Riskiness of Activities Using a Risk-Taking Scale by Adolescents and Young Adults

摘要

Human factors forensic consultants often need to evaluate the reasonableness of conductin the course of their investigations. Many cases involve adolescents who, in general,have a reputation for being more likely to engage in risky behaviors. The present studyevaluates and compares risk perception and risk-taking behaviors of adolescents andyoung adults. The Domain Specific Risk Taking Scale was used to obtain reported levelsof risk-taking and perceived risk attitudes regarding four commonly encountered contentdomains: ethical, health/safety, social, and recreational; an additional subscale evaluatingeating disordered behavior was created for this study. The results indicate thatadolescents reported a higher likelihood of risk-taking behavior than young adults on therecreational subscale, but were no different than young adults for the health/safety, socialand eating disorder subscales. Adolescents perceived unethical behavior as lower risk,and were more likely to participate in such behaviors. Adolescent risk perception forhealth/safety, recreational, social and eating disorders subscales were not found to bedifferent than that reported by the young adults.