Risk

The ground seems so ridiculously far away. As your brain recognizes the clear and present danger, your heart begins to beat wildly, your blood pressure increases, your mouth becomes uncomfortably dry, and you have an almost irresistible urge to avoid what is about to happen. The brain begins to give out corticotropin-releasing hormone, which triggers the brain to produce adrenocorticotropin that, in turn, persuades the adrenal glands to create cortisol. Breathing much faster now, blood surges around the body, draining away from unimportant areas like the stomach into muscles, and creating "butterflies". Pupils dilate, allowing perception of movement, increased clarity, and see into the shadows and darkness. The immune system prepares to deal with injuries, and emergency reserves of the energy are released to prepare for bursts of strength (Llewellyn). It is known how this response occurs and most of why it does but what is not understood is why humans seek this. This is the universal emotion of fear, and the perception of risk. Risk taking comes with human's genes, it is an inherit necessity, but it has served its purpose and in modern society causes much grief.

Originating at the dawn of Homo sapiens, risk taking stems from the need to take risks to survive. Faced with an inhospitable environment, early man was forced to take great risks, in particular travel large distances in order to find refuge, food, and mates, humans had no option to "play it safe". Early man not willing to take risk had a low chance of survival and, therefore, risk taking genes became prominent through natural selection. These primal instincts have caused the human race to seek out risks throughout its history, one such event being the Bering Strait crossing by early Man . However, this causes modern man to not be designed for urbanized postindustrial lifestyles, and humans are forced to seek it in a new way, manifesting itself in the sport of rock climbing, and taking illicit drugs.

Although all mankind takes risks to one degree or another, it is theorized that one's personality has a lot to do with what risks we are willing to take. A person's personality traits are determining characteristics of are individuality, and explain the regularities of a persons behavior. Because of this people naturally react to identical situations in a vast variety of responses. There are many categories for these traits and they are affected by a person's genetics and childhood years. One of these traits is the sensation seeking trait proposed by Professor Marvin Zuckerman when concluding that those who volunteer for experiments share similar personalities. Professor Zuckerman theorizes that there are four categories of this risk, or sensation seeking trait: "Thrill and Adventure Seeking", "Experience Seeking", "Disinhibition", and "Boredom Susceptibility" (Llewellyn). Thrill and adventure seekers are more willing to put oneself in physical danger and participate in such high risk sports as mountain climbing. Experience seekers find the need to constantly partake in new, exciting experiences; this is associated with all types of risk taking. "Disinhibitionists" (Llewellyn) regularly partake