What is risk-taking behaviour?

Risk taking is basically doing something that feels exciting, or dangerous.  Safe risk-taking is a positive tool in anyone’s life which can help you discover and develop your identity and who you are. Unsafe risks are when you have no fear of what might happen to you, your health, emotions or your future.  

The important thing is that you feel you have a choice and are in control of the risk and you know what the consequences will be so that you can choose to take ‘safe’ risks that will give you  positive results that help you to develop.

Why do young people take risks?

Becoming a young person is a time of great change in your life, when you want to experiment with new things, like drinking or being out late. There are also a lot of new emotions and feelings.  You are becoming a young adult and trying to find your place in the world by testing out a whole load of new and exciting things that you couldn’t do when you were a child.

Risk taking can be a way to gain these new experiences and help you to grow up quicker.  

Becoming a young adult can be both exciting and frightening and make a lot of young people feel insecure. You may feel a greater need to fit in with people of your own age, follow the crowd and impress your mates. It might feel like there is a lot of pressure to do certain risky things, like diving off the groyne (wall) into the sea or having sex or drinking or getting into trouble. When you take risks you might get an adrenalin buzz that feels great, but this can cloud your judgement.

If risk-taking is so common, why don't parents and adults like young people to take risks?

As we’ve said trying new things is good for us and a natural part of growing up.  However, some risk taking can put your health - and even your life - in danger. It might seem like adults are just trying to spoil your fun, but really their main concern is to keep you safe.  You can help by keeping them in the picture.

What can I do to protect myself?

Many activities that we take part in are also potentially harmful. The trick is to minimise the unsafe risks. This doesn’t stop the fun, it just means you can have more fun while making sure nothing bad will happen to you. The most common examples of unsafe risks could be having unprotected sex, using drugs or smoking.  You might feel like it at times, but no-one is invincible! 

Questions you could ask yourself to see if you are taking unsafe risks are:

• Do you feel pressured to make risky choices by friends?
• Do you rush into decisions?
• Do you think it is uncool or boring to do things in a safe way?
• Are dangerous risks more exciting? Do they feel more like you?
• Do you make dangerous choices to show others what you can do?
• Does it feel as though it's happening "in a dream" when you make dangerous choices?

The things that can help you take safe risks are:

• Try to find out the good and bad effects of something i.e. drugs, alcohol and sex. This will give you a chance to take responsibility for what you decide to do.
• Think about how you could make the risk safer.
• Try talking to your parents or other adults especially if you feel under pressure or worried. Sometimes, you will have to educate them. But remember, they were all teenagers once.
• Be confident. High self-esteem is powerful; not only will you be able to stand firm against pressure from the crowd, but you might even find that the crowd start to follow you.

Links

www.risktaking.co.uk/

This is a bit of a full on website, but it gives you a lot of information about what risk taking is and explains how and why people take risks in their lives.