Teenagers shape each other’s views on how risky a situation is

Young adolescents' judgements on how risky a situation might be are most influenced by what other teenagers think, while most other age groups are more influenced by adults' views, finds new UCL research. For the study, published in Psychological Science, 563 visitors to the London Science Museum were asked to rate the riskiness of everyday situations such as crossing a road on a red light or taking a shortcut through a dark alley. Ratings were given on a continuous scale from low to high risk, and children (aged 8-11) generally rated situations as more risky than all other age groups. Participants were then told how other people, either teenagers or adults, had rated the same situations, before being asked to rate each situation again. These risk levels from 'adults' or 'teenagers' were in fact randomly generated. The results showed that all age groups were socially influenced and changed their risk ratings in the direction of other people's, but this social influence effect decreased with age. Most age groups adjusted their ratings more to conform to the ratings of adults than those of teenagers, except for young adolescents (aged 12-14).