This episode starts off a little differently than others — with a short quiz, something called the Brief Sensation-Seeking Scale, which will tell you whether you’re what psychologists call a high sensation-seeker or a low sensation-seeker. Read the following eight statements, and then pick a number from 1 to 5 that corresponds to your level of agreement, where 1 is “Not at all like me,” 2 is “Not like me,” 3 is “Unsure or both like and not like me,” 4 is “Like me,” and 5 is “Very much like me.”
- I would like to explore strange places.
- I would like to take off on a trip with no pre-planned routes or timetables.
- I get restless when I spend too much time alone.
- I prefer friends who are excitingly unpredictable.
- I like wild parties.
- I would love to have new and exciting experiences, even if they are illegal.
- I would like to try bungee jumping.
- I would like to do frightening things.
Now add up all the numbers together. If you scored between 8 and 16, you are a low sensation-seeker. If you scored between 16 and 28, you’re about average for sensation-seeking. If you scored over 28, you’re a high sensation-seeker.
Today on the show, I unpack what these categories of personality mean with Dr. Kenneth Carter, a clinical psychologist, a professor, and the author of Buzz!: Inside the Minds of Thrill-Seekers, Daredevils, and Adrenaline Junkies. Ken explains how sensation-seeking exists on a spectrum between chill seekers, who like safety and calm routine, and thrill seekers, who enjoy chaos, risk, and novelty. He shares how there are actually four components to high sensation-seeking, and which two tend to get people in trouble. And we talk about whether being high or low sensation-seeking is a matter of nature or nurture, how high sensation-seekers fare in romantic relationships and what they should consider in choosing a career, and what the world’s chill seekers can learn from its thrill seekers.
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Read the Transcript
Brett McKay: Brett McKay here. And welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness Podcast. So I’m gonna start this episode out a bit differently today than others by giving you a little quiz. It’s something called the brief sensation seeking scale, which will tell you whether you’re what psychologists call a high sensation seeker or a low sensation seeker. So I’m gonna read you eight statements and then you’re gonna pick a number from one to five, where one is not at all like me, two is not like me, three is unsure, or both like and not like me. Four is like me and five is very much like me. All right, got that? Are you ready? You got your pen and paper? All right. So here we go. Here’s the first statement. I would like to explore strange places. So remember to assign the statement a number one through five, where one is not at all like me, and five is very much like me.
So again, statement number one, I would like to explore strange places. All right, number two, I would like to take off on a trip with no pre-planned routes or timetables. Number three, I get restless when I spend too much time alone. Number four, I prefer friends who are excitingly unpredictable. Number five, I like wild parties. Number six, I would love to have new and exciting experiences even if they are illegal. Number seven, I would like to try bungee jumping. Number eight, I would like to do frightening things. Okay. Now, what I want you to do is add up all those numbers together. If you score between eight and 16, you are a low sensation seeker. If you score between 16 and 28, you’re about average for sensation seeking. And if you scored over 28, you are a high sensation seeker.
Today on the show, I’ll unpack what these categories of personality mean with Dr. Kenneth Carter, a clinical psychologist, a professor, and the author of Buzz! Inside the minds of thrill seekers, daredevils and adrenaline junkies. Ken explains how sensation seeking exists on a spectrum between chill seekers who like safety and calm routine and thrill seekers who enjoy chaos, risk and novelty. He shares how there are actually four components of high sensation seeking and which two tend to get people in trouble. And we talk about whether being high or low sensation seeking is a matter of nature or nurture. How high sensation seekers bear in romantic relationships and what they should consider in choosing a career and what the world’s chill seekers can learn from its thrill seekers. After the show is over, check out our show notes at aom.is/buzz. All right, Ken Carter, welcome to the show.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Thank you for having me.
Brett McKay: So you are a clinical psychologist and you are professor of psychology and you’ve written a book about scary, like why we like to be scared. [laughter] I thought you’d be the perfect person to talk to ’cause it’s Halloween. It’s the time of year when people are visiting haunted houses, they’re watching scary movies. Generally most people don’t like being scared.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah.
Brett McKay: But in some circumstances, I think all of us, to a certain extent, like doing scary things, like to play scary video games. Whether that’s five nights at Freddy’s, which my kids played a long time ago. Riding a rollercoaster. ‘Cause We want that little bit of, we want to be scared. Why do we have a taste for scary and thrilling things?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. So different kinds of psychologists have different theories about that. The classic one from Freud says there are ids, like love that sort of death instinct kind of thing. And then other theories, like for example from sensation seeking says that we sort of love that newness, that sort of surprise that comes along with it. And so I’m actually in the group of people who don’t like to be scared too much, which is odd because I wrote a book about how people like doing thrilling things. But you’re right, most people do enjoy those surprises to an extent.
Brett McKay: So it sounds like the inclination to seek out scary stuff, it resides on a spectrum. So you’re on that end where it’s like, ah, I don’t really like it all that much.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: No, no. I study thrill seekers, but I’m definitely a chill seeker myself.
Brett McKay: Are some people completely like they don’t even wanna watch a scary movie at all, like they don’t want any type of thrill at all?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. I mean, even though I’m pretty low, I mean, I’ve met people who are even lower who don’t like being frightened that have sort of an aversive reaction to fear in some ways. But I’ve also met people that are the opposite where they don’t even remember having any fear in them whatsoever. I actually interviewed a woman who didn’t realize that she was in danger until someone told her that she was in danger. So yeah, definitely quite a spectrum.
Brett McKay: Okay. So your book Buzz! You did extensive research on the people who love scary stuff. They’re on that far end the spectrum. So this is interesting ’cause you’re a guy who doesn’t like scary stuff and you decide, I’m gonna figure out what’s going on with these people that like to do crazy stuff, go to really scary haunted houses, BASE jump, bungee jump, all that sort of thing. And these are people who go out of their way to do thrilling and dangerous things. And the academic term for this is high sensation seeking. You mentioned some theories as to why most people like small scares in their life. What are the theories as to why there are people who are especially oriented to intense thrills?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. I mean, if you think about it from an evolutionary standpoint, we need people who, or there’s a benefit to people who can tolerate that chaos in life. Because if you’re in a dangerous situation, you want someone that’s going to be calm to sort of help you out of that. And so yeah, there are definitely some evolutionary benefits to having some members of our population who are high sensation seekers, who can tolerate that chaos. There’s also some evolutionary benefits to having some chill seekers, right? To prevent us from going in those directions. So you need a little bit of both in society.
Brett McKay: When psychologists try to explain this is thrill seeking, is it a personality type? Like I think everyone who is listening to this show has probably heard of like the Big Five personality traits, extroversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, openness to new stuff. Is thrill seeking like an amalgamation of those different Big Five Personality traits or is it something separate?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: It’s a little bit different. I mean, I think because… So when I’m teaching about personality theories or research personality theories, I think of those things like grand theories that try to explain a bunch of different things in their personality. And the Big Five is sort of one of those grand theories. Freud is a grand theory. I call sensation seeking kind of a mini theory because it sort of does one thing pretty well, but it doesn’t really explain other aspects of our personality. So there are just like a couple of different components of it. And if you’re using it to explain like why people might choose to do different things, works really well for that. It’s like a single use tool. [laughter]
Brett McKay: So what are the components of high sensation seeking personalities?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. So we call them thrill seekers, but there’s really four different kinds of components. The first two, tell me a little bit about the kinds of things you might choose to do. And the last two, tell me how much trouble you might get yourself into with your sensation seeking. And there’s a pretty quick test. There’s like eight questions that you can… To take to sort of figure out where on the scale you might be. So the first one is called thrill and adventure seeking. These are people who like sort of physical thrills. It could be bungee jumping, BASE diving, those things that we normally think of with thrill seekers. The second one is really sensations of the mind and of the senses. These are people who might like be drawn to interesting people or maybe drawn to interesting foods or even sort of adventure travel.
So it’s not the danger that beckons them, it’s sort of the curiosity of what happens in their mind. The last two, like I mentioned before, tells you how much trouble you might get yourself into. One of them is called disinhibition. These are people who, if you score really low on this, you sort of look before you leap and sort of think things through. If you score high, you just leap. You just sort of put yourself in it and figure it out later. And the last one is called boredom susceptibility, is how easy you get bored and how irritated you get when you get bored. And so you can have different kinds of high sensation seekers because you might be a high sensation seeker but you don’t like dangerous stuff. But you love cultures, you love trying different foods. You take a big bite of an unusual food no matter what. And the kinds of ways that you sort of are in the world are gonna be pieces of those different four components.
Brett McKay: Okay. So let’s recap here. So there’s four components of high sensation seeking. The first is the desire for physical thrills. These are high stimulus activities like skydiving and mountain climbing. The second is a desire for mental sensations and sensations of the senses. So this is seeking less risky experiences like travel, art, music. The third is disinhibition. So it is just being more impulsive. And fourth is a susceptibility to boredom. So it’s a dislike of repetition and a desire for new external stimuli. I mean, someone could have different constellations of these traits. Like you could be high on thrill and adventure seeking where you love doing dangerous stuff, but you’re low on disinhibition. Like you’re disciplined, you’re conscientious. And actually a lot of the people you highlight that do dangerous stuff, they’re like that. Like because they’re doing stuff that can get you killed. So they have to be in control.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yes, yes. Like ice climbers for example. I interviewed one of the very first people to climb up Niagara Falls frozen. It takes a lot of focus and concentration to tell what kind of ice it might be holding you or not. So you don’t really wanna be a high disinhibited, ice climber. Right? Because you need that discipline to be able to do that pretty well.
Brett McKay: And going back to this idea that this thrill seeking is a mini theory of personality, I can see situations where you can look at someone who on the Big Five personality, it looks like they should be a thrill seeker. They’re extroverted, they’re not very conscientious, et cetera, but they’re actually, they don’t like doing dangerous stuff. Things like that. So I really, I thought that was really interesting that you have to look at thrill seeking as almost kinda like a little bit of separate personality. You can’t just look at someone’s overall grand personality and peg them as a thrill seeker.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. In fact, one of the biggest like, the easiest to imagine that thrill seekers are these extroverted sort of wild people who will do whatever. But what I’ve realized is sometimes it’s the really quiet ones, those introverted high sensation seekers are going to do a lot of those things that… And you wouldn’t have expected because you’re sort of looking for an extrovert. But a lot of high sensation seekers are introverts as well.
Brett McKay: Yeah. We had a guy on the podcast, Tommy Caldwell, who’s one of those free climbers who scaled El Capitan in Yosemite and this guy, high on thrill seeking, but he also seemed pretty introverted.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah, yeah. This is the thing I love about psychology, is like it helps you to understand like what might be going on inside someone’s mind and sort of put aside some of those assumptions you might have about different personality types.
Brett McKay: Is thrill seeking or high sensation seeking, is it a matter of nature or nurture or is it both?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: It’s a little bit of both. Some of the research suggests that maybe like 60% or so may be biological because there are some chemicals that are involved in sensation seeking that are a little bit different than in high sensation seekers than average and low sensation seekers. But we know that environment can have a big impact on that as well.
Brett McKay: To the biology, how is the physiology in a high sensation seeker different from someone of low or average sensation seeking?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. So there’s a lot of differences, but the ones I usually talk about to help people think through, because there’s some chemicals that people are usually aware of, focus on cortisol and dopamine. So cortisol, as you probably know, is that sort of stress hormone. It helps organize our body for that fight, flee or freeze response when there’s lots of chaos or dangerous things. So if you are surprised or scared, your heart rate will go up, your muscles rev up for those kinds of things. What we find is that high sensation seekers don’t tend to produce as much cortisol in those chaotic moments. They’re actually pretty chill and calm during those things that would normally cause people a cortisol response, but their dopamine levels tend to be a little bit higher. So dopamine is a neurotransmitter that most people have heard of that’s associated with pleasure. And so when high sensation seekers are confronted with these chaotic experiences, they feel a lot of pleasure but not that much stress. And so it’s a very interesting combination of chemicals that sort of leads them to feeling the way they do. Their body is just telling them that it’s not a dangerous thing. Low sensation seekers like me, I produce a lots of cortisol all the time, so I’m gonna feel freely stressed out but not that much pleasure in those chaotic experiences that high sensation seekers are really gonna be sort of vibing in.
Brett McKay: All right. So the high sensation seekers, whenever they encounter a dangerous maybe different situation, their response is go towards it. Low sensation seekers are like go away.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah, yeah, yeah. ‘Cause we’re trying to avoid those things that might be dangerous, but if your body is not telling you it’s dangerous, then it doesn’t feel dangerous.
Brett McKay: Well, this is the Art of Manliness Podcast. Does testosterone play a role in sensation seeking?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: It does. So testosterone levels tend to peak in early adolescence, which is around the same time that you’d expect to see lots of sensation seeking. And so as people get older, their testosterone levels start to fall. We do see some changes in sensation seeking as people get older.
Brett McKay: Yeah. And this connection between testosterone and sensation seeking is also why you see more men who are high sensation seekers than women. At least in three of the four sensation seeking categories, though women actually outscore men in the experience seeking category, which I think is interesting. But yeah, everyone has testosterone so everyone also gets that decrease as you get older. And you highlighted people in your book where when they were young, maybe young adults, they did crazy stuff, travel without a plan, eat weird food, [laughter] jump off of bridges. But when they got married or had kids, they started scaling that back.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah.
Brett McKay: A lot. And I’ve noticed that in my own life. I’m 40, I’ll be 42 here soon. When I was younger I was up for… I’m not a super high sensation seeker, but when I was younger, I would do crazy stuff. But now I look back like I’m like why did I do that? I was really dumb. [laughter] If I was given that opportunity again, I’d be like, no, I’m gonna pass on that.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. Yeah. And part of that’s environmental and part of it’s biological, biological change, the changes in those hormones like testosterone or another chemical called MAO tends to decrease in people that’s associated with sensation seeking. But I also talked a little bit about things I called anchors in your life, things that sort of anchor you in, because the older you get the more you have to lose. Right? And so thinking about how other people might be impacted with those choices makes a big difference as well.
Brett McKay: Right. So maybe a guy is very cavalier about climbing dangerous mountains in his youth, but when he gets married and has kids, he starts having second thoughts about that pursuit. So we talked about nature. Let’s talk about nurture a little bit. What does the research say about the way someone’s upbringing as a child can nudge them towards high sensation seeking?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah, a couple things. I mean, and it’s hard to sort of figure out sometimes because there might be lots of influences on that. Some of the research suggested that people that grew up with either spirituality or some religious background had some impact on their disinhibition. There’s also some research that suggested that high sensation seekers said that they had more controlling parents. But it’s very possible that parents might have seemed controlling because they were wanting to do high sensation seeking things. And so hard to figure out like what those environmental influences could be because there’s so many influences in a person’s life.
Brett McKay: One thing I thought was interesting is if someone grew up in a home with a lot of kids, that might nudge them towards high sensation seeking ’cause they grew up in a household that was pretty chaotic.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. And so that tolerance of chaos can create that as well. Yeah.
Brett McKay: We’re gonna take a quick break for a word from our sponsors. And now back to the show. So in addition to kind of exploring why some people are more prone to being high sensation seekers or low sensation seekers, you also looked at like well, how does this affect the rest of their lives? So some of these high sensation seekers like to eat weird food, they like to do crazy dangerous stuff, but how does it affect other facets of their life, like work, relationships? So let’s talk about relationships. How do high sensation seekers approach their friendships and romantic lives?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Probably in the same way they approach other aspects, where they can tolerate that chaos. They are taking their sort of whole selves into those relationships. One of the things that sort of surprised me in the research was, and it probably shouldn’t have, but that… Because we all think that other people see the world like we do, right? [laughter] And so a high sensation seeker thinks that other people aren’t as frightened of things that might be frightening. And so they can sometimes have trouble with other people in terms of them being frightened by the things they do or not being able to tolerate the chaos in certain ways. And so that can be a struggle with some high sensation seekers who have friends or relationships with individuals who may be average and low sensation seekers. But for the most part, they’re sort of drawn to either high or low sensation seekers fairly equally.
Brett McKay: Do they like more… I don’t know… How do I say this? Drama in a relationship? Is there drama given the sensation that they need?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. And that’s one of the things that drew me to this research begin with, ’cause I was originally gonna write a book about people that I called chaos junkies, people who seem to crave chaotic experiences, and so we know that high sensation-seekers, they have that really wonderful balance of dopamine and cortisol when they’re in chaotic situations, and so sometimes high sensation-seekers won’t back down from chaotic situations because they’re fine in that space. And so they may create that drama because that’s the space they tend to operate the best in.
Brett McKay: Yeah, talking about… Going back to the physiological response that high sensation-seekers have compared to low sensation-seekers, I imagine that someone with low sensation-seeking personality, whenever they encounter a social conflict like the cortisol is just pumping through their body, they don’t get any dopamine out of it. This is unpleasant, and so they just want to avoid any conflict whatsoever, whereas the high sensation-seeker, whenever there’s a conflict in the relationship, it could just be over just dumb stuff, the cortisol is not pumping through their body, so they don’t see a problem with the argument or the disagreement. They’re just like, “Oh, this is just normal. And it’s fine and everything is okay.” Whereas the low sensation-seeker will be like, “This is awful. The relationship is terrible. We’re in a bad place.” So I imagine that could happen.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. Which is really the thing that drew into psychology anyway, when you have one situation, you see two people responding really differently to it. You have this study that I talked about in the book, where it was a really interesting study where they have high and low sensation-seekers, and they had to pick. They were given a profile of different people that they might have a conversation with, and they could choose whether or not they want to pick a conversation that would create conflict as they talked or one that wouldn’t. And the low sensation-seekers, just like you sort of described, picked low conflict conversations. The high sensation-seekers picked the things where they thought they might have an argument because that’s the space where they operate best in, which reminds me of certain people that I know is like, “Why would you talk about that, when you know that they don’t like talking about it?” It’s because it creates that chaos, that’s sort of that perfect combination for some high sensation-seekers.
Brett McKay: Yeah. The high sensation-seekers, the guy at Thanksgiving dinner was like, “Hey, tell me who you’ve voted for.”
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Right. [laughter]
Brett McKay: I’m like, “Yeah, okay.”
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Everyone else is going, “No.” And for them, they’re happy to approach it because they aren’t feeling this thing, that cortisol that other people might in those situations, they’re just full of dopamine.
Brett McKay: Yeah. And then I’m curious, are high sensation-seekers and low sensation-seekers able to be romantically partnered?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: They can. Yeah. So high sensation-seekers really are focused on that relationship piece, they’re drawn equally to high and low sensation-seekers for romantic relationships. The piece they have to watch out for is that empathy around the things that might cause that low sensation-seekers some stress. So what I recommend that people do is say they take this sensation-seeking survey and they can find out where there might be some ways where they can come together. The one couple I’ve worked with, for example, they found out that they both have high levels of experience-seeking, so they might do some adventure travel together, even though the high sensation-seeker might also be high and throw on adventure, they’re not gonna take their partner with them bungee jumping, but they might do some fun food adventures, for example, or travel to unusual places together.
Brett McKay: Oh, I thought it was interesting in the relationship section, we talk about the six styles of love from this guy, John Allen Lee, and he developed this in the 1970s. And so the six different types, they come from Greek types of love: Agape, eros, storge, pragma, mania and ludus. And so ludus is game-playing love, so this is people who are drawn to the hunt for love, the chase, that’s what they like. And research shows that high sensation-seekers are more drawn to that ludic type of love.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. And I know as a clinical psychologist that it takes different kinds of skills to find someone than it is to maintain a relationship, so I wondered whether or not high sensation-seekers may be better at the beginnings of relationships and may struggle sometimes with the middle of relationships, because for some people that I interviewed, that part just gets dull to them. One woman I talked to said that she not only jumps out of perfectly good airplanes, but she jumps out of perfectly good relationships because she gets bored, and that’s part of that… That can be part of that sensation-seeking personality for some people.
Brett McKay: Yeah, reminds of me that BB King song, ‘The Thrill is Gone’, that’s what the high sensation-seeker might say…
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Right, right. And so finding ways of maintaining that or even being aware that that could be an issue can really help some people. And that’s one of things I love about doing stuff like this, where writing a book for every day people, hopefully some people will see themselves in that description and maybe try to navigate that a little bit better.
Brett McKay: Let’s talk about the work that high sensation-seekers are drawn to, what kind of job do they like to do?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: I think about sensation-seeking as a part of a person’s personality, some people employ that in their work and not just in their out-of work time, so you can see that in first responders, for example, people in the military, I interviewed an emergency room physician and a nurse, anywhere where you expect to find chaos, you want people who can handle that chaos in a way that is elegant. But sometimes they find themselves out of those kinds of jobs and that can be tough for them because they use that part of their personality in their jobs.
Brett McKay: Okay. So if you’re a high sensation-seeker and you just constantly feel bored at work, maybe one suggestion there is to find a job that offers more sensation.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Right. Right. Or find some recreational activity that can account for that, for sure.
Brett McKay: And going back to this idea that there’s not just one type of high sensation-seeker, you can be someone who likes to look for excitement, thrill, et cetera, but is low on disinhibition, you’re disciplined. So you talk to a lot of military special forces guys who love the thrill of jumping out of an airplane or being shot at, but they were incredibly, incredibly disciplined.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yes. And so those are people that probably had low levels of disinhibition and hopefully low levels of boredom susceptibility as well, so they could use that, throw in adventure-seeking or experience-seeking in their careers in the military.
Brett McKay: Yeah, let’s talk about… I’m curious about this, you’ve done some research on this a little bit, is high sensation-seeking associated with any let’s say personality pathologies like sociopathy or psychopathy?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: It can. And what I don’t wanna suggest is that people that are high sensation-seekers have some kind of psychological disorder, but when you look at certain kinds of psychological disorders, there are high sensation-seekers may be over-represented in certain categories. You can see them over-represent in anti-social personality disorder, a little bit over-represented in addictive disorders, whether or not there are behavioral addictions or even different kinds of chemical addictions as well.
Brett McKay: Do you have any advice for high sensation-seekers who are listening right now on how to use their unique personality trait to flourish in life and make the world a better place?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. I think that the key is to make sure that you have that disinhibition and boredom susceptibility sort of under control, but also to think about that empathy piece in terms of how other people might experience that high sensation seeking. If you’re in a car and changing lanes and going back and forth, you’re probably really chill, but your passenger may be really freaked out and you might not realize it, so it’s important to stop and think and to be able to see how other people might experience those things that you might be doing to make sure those relationships are going well.
Brett McKay: Any advice for parents who’ve got kids with… Like, this kid might be a high sensation-seeker and they’re just pulling their hair out, ’cause they’re just driving them crazy?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. And I’ve got a lot of emails from parents asking for that kind of advice. To me, finding some things that their kids might do so they can do that high sensation-seeking in a healthy way. One thing I really try to emphasize is that these things that you see high sensation-seeking people do, is not just what they do, is sort of who they are as a person. We can find that when people aren’t allowed to express that, you can really impact them, ’cause they don’t have access to that thing that brings them awe. So maybe enroll them in activities where they can do those high sensation-seeking kinds of things, whether or not it’s that emotional high sensation-seeking in terms of the experience-seeking, or maybe it’s a certain gem that really emphasizes rock climbing or adventurous sports, helping them find a way to do that, that’s safe and respectful of other people, is everything.
Brett McKay: All right. So give them an outlet is basically what you’re saying. What about… I would consider myself today on the lower end of sensation-seeking. Is there anything we can learn from high sensation-seekers?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: I feel like there are. I feel like… One of the things I feel like I learned from talking to high sensation-seekers or a couple of things that I really try to employ in my life a lot more, part of it is sort of trusting yourself. I think a lot of low sensation-seekers we’re trying to avoid risk at all cost, but the thing I’ve found from a lot of high sensation-seekers is that they trust themselves and that things work out better than they think they’re going to. They did this really interesting study that I always love talking about whenever I have a chance, where they had people think about what things were they worried about at the moment, and then they came back to them a couple of weeks later to say, “Hey, did those things that you were worried about actually happen? And if they did happen, how did you handle it?” And what they discovered was about 80% of the things that people worry about on a daily basis never happen, but as a low sensation-seeker, I feel like I sort of arrange my life so I have a plan A, a plan B, a plan C for everything. High sensation-seekers trust themselves and they sort of put themselves into situations and they figure it out, and I feel like that’s a lesson, I feel like I’ve learned from them.
Brett McKay: Have you done any crazy thing since you’ve done this book? [laughter]
Dr. Kenneth Carter: I think the book was probably the craziest thing I’ve done, but those physical things, I just don’t have the hardware to run that sort of program. I get too overwhelmed too much, not enough dopamine, way too much cortisol. But I feel like I have tried more unusual foods because I feel like the worst that can happen is that I just don’t like it. So one thing I tell a lot of low sensation-seekers is to sort of embrace your own version of awe. That awe for a high sensation-seeker is going to be bungee jumping and BASE diving, that may not be your awe. And so the things that I find full of awe are going to be kind of dull for high sensation-seekers, but I feel like I’m gonna find my dopamine in my own ways.
Brett McKay: Yeah, I love that. So yeah, fill your own type of awe, try new things. So if someone gives you a “Hey, let’s go do this new thing.” Instead of being like, “Oh no, I don’t wanna do that.” Yeah, just go ahead and do it. You probably won’t regret it.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Yeah. Right, right.
Brett McKay: Well, Ken, this has been a great conversation, where can people go to learn more about the book and your work?
Dr. Kenneth Carter: I’m at drkencarter.com on social media, but also on my website as well, so you can check out my book, which is Buzz! Inside The Minds Of Thrill-Seekers, Daredevils, and Adrenaline Junkies, anywhere you find books online.
Brett McKay: Fantastic. Well, Ken Carter, thanks for your time. It’s been a pleasure.
Dr. Kenneth Carter: Thanks so much.
Brett McKay: My guest here is Dr. Ken Carter, he’s the author of the book Buzz! It’s available on amazon.com. Check out our show notes at aom.is/buzz, where you can find links to resources, we delve deeper into this topic, including a more comprehensive test for determining where you are on the sensation-seeking scale.
Well, that wraps up another edition of The AOM Podcast, make sure to check out our website at artofmanliness.com, where you can find our podcast archives as well as thousands of articles that we’ve written over the years about pretty much anything you think of. And if you haven’t done so already, I’d appreciate if you to take one minute to give us a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify, it helps out a lot. And if you’ve done that already, thank you. Please consider sharing the show with a friend or family member, who you think will get something out of it. As always, thank you for the continued support. Until next time it’s Brett McKay, reminding you to not only listen to AOM Podcast, but put what you’ve heard into action.
