Life is either a daring adventure, or it is boring: The impact of COVID‐19 on immoral and nonmoral risk taking behaviors

Abstract

Findings from correlational research suggest that people more likely to take risk during COVID‐19. However, little is known about the causal role of the coronavirus threat in the emergence of risk taking behaviors. Here, we conducted three diverse studies involving questionnaire‐based responses and actual measures of risk‐taking behavior across nonmoral and immoral domains. In support of our theoretical perspective, Experiment 1 revealed that participants who were exposed to the COVID‐19 threat were more prone to take risks than those in the control condition. Experiment 2 aimed to replicate the findings of Experiment 1 using a behavioral measure to capture participants' interest in risk taking. The results showed that the salience of COVID‐19 can increase individuals' willingness to take risks in a nonmoral domain, namely, bungee jumping. Experiment 3 provided a behavioral confirmation of the relationship uncovered in an immoral domain (i.e., bribery). Across three experiments, we found that boredom state mediated the effect of the pandemic influence on risk taking. Together, our research rounds out the picture of contributors to risk taking and underscores the cumulative destructive effect of COVID‐19. We discuss implications for research on COVID‐19 and risk taking, as well as practical significance for society at large.

Risk perception, compliance with COVID-19 measures, and the role of social media after China's lockdown lift

“…In this circumstance, people might give up trying to adhere to preventative advice. This agrees with the finding that people who were exposed to greater threats were more likely to take risks [ 36 ]. Therefore, people should be informed that the lockdown was only lifted after carefully assessing the virus' infectiousness.…”

“…To avoid a disconnect between self-reported response and actual behavior in natural settings [ 36 , 42 ], we designed experiments to observe participants’ adherence to health behavior in private and in public, and had them finish a paper questionnaire on risk perception and trust in social media. We obtained the same results as in Experiment 1.…”

“…It was 2.04 in the initial survey). First, much evidence suggests the prevalence of risky behaviors under the threat of risk [ 36 ]. For example, Bhutani, van Dellen and Cooper [ 44 ] found that individuals tend to engage in riskier dining habits, such as having a large proportion of ultra-processed foods and a low intake of healthy fruits, during the COVID-19 pandemic.…”

Does the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown affect risk attitudes?—Evidence from rural Thailand

“…Given the difficulties of data collection during the global pandemic, many empirical studies rely on student samples [ 29 , 30 , 53 , 87 , 90 ] or online experiment tools, such as Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) [ 86 , 88 , 91 ]. Nonetheless, a few studies use nationally representative household survey data to investigate the stability of risk attitudes under the COVID-19 pandemic.…”