Are you more risk-seeking when helping others? Effects of situational urgency and peer presence on prosocial risky behavior.

Introduction: Prosocial risky behavior (PRB) proposes that individuals take risks for others' benefits or social welfare, and that this may involve trade-offs between risk and social preferences. However, little is known about the underlying cognitive mechanisms of risk-seeking or aversion during PRB.

Methods: This study adopted the dilemma-priming paradigm to examine the interaction between the risk levels of personal cost and situational urgency on PRB (Experiment 1,   = 88), and it further uncovered the modulation of the risk levels of failure (Experiment 2,   = 65) and peer presence (Experiment 3,   = 80) when helping others.