'Life would be pretty dull without risk': Voluntary risk-taking and its pleasures

Abstract

Most writing in the social sciences on risk-taking tends to represent it as the product of ignorance or irrationality. The modern subject tends to be portrayed in this writing as risk-aversive and fearful of risk, constantly seeking ways of avoiding it. While there has been an extensive literature on people's perceptions of risk, little empirical research has attempted to investigate the meanings given to voluntary risk-taking: that is, risk-taking that is undertaken without coercion in the full acknowledgement that risks are being confronted. In this article we present findings from our qualitative research on a group of Australians' risk knowledges and experiences, using in-depth interviews to explore the meanings given to risk and the discourses used to express ideas about risk. We focus here on what our interviewees had to say about their experiences of, and views about, voluntary risk-taking. We identify and discuss three dominant discourses in our interviewees' accounts: those of self-improvement, emotional engagement and control. Our conclusion relates these discourses to wider discourses and notions about subjectivity and embodiment.