A Risk Worth Taking

Pundits are singing choruses about the danger of risk. By taking too much financial risk, we've put our homes, our credit rating and our economic system in jeopardy.

But taking risk is also almost certainly what will get us out of this mess, too--at least according to a passel of neuroscientists and behavioral economists.

"Most people think of risk as a negative thing," says Barbara Sahakian, professor of clinical neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine. "But risk has some real evolutional and functional value."

Sahakian explored the good side of risk in a recent commentary in the journal Nature, where she discusses results of an experiment that compared the decision-making abilities of entrepreneurs with garden-variety managers.

Not surprisingly, entrepreneurs proved to be riskier, but in a good way. They were able to combine abilities that managers also had--like making emotionally neutral decisions that required analysis--with the ability to make smart decisions under pressure and the ability to approach problems from different angles. She calls what these entrepreneurs possess "functional impulsivity."

Our ability to take risks, smart or otherwise, is affected by a whole suite of factors. Individuals have widely different tolerances for risk, that tolerance changes over time and people are also affected by the environment and other people around them.

In another recent study, Heather Rupp of Indiana's Kinsey Institute peered into the brains of women to learn what was going on when they were thinking of choosing a mate. She showed young, unattached women a series of pictures of men with their faces morphed to look more masculine or feminine and asked how likely they were to have sex with the men.