Ermüdung und Risikoverhalten - Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln

Zusammenfassung / Summary
Therefore, the first step of the present study was to develop two reality-oriented
tools to measure physical risk acceptance in risk situations in the context of
activity: the blind-jump-test and the video test “virtual jump”.
The blind-jump-test centers on a realistic risk situation for the test person, whereas
the risk situation in the video test “virtual jump” is obviously just virtual.
In both tests the risk situation posed is a jump situation. The test person was to
identify the maximum height which they would think it still safe to jump down from.
The applicability of the tools described was tested in multiple independent
examinations before they were used in the main experimental phase. The results
point towards reliability and validity of the developed tools. Consequently, their use
in the present research program was deemed possible.
In the main experimental phase (second step) which followed, fatigue underwent a
controlled variation and the situational risk acceptance before and after inducing
fatigue was measured with the aforementioned tools. In summary one can say that
the results of the main experiments offer hints to a coherence of physical and
mental fatigue and situational risk acceptance, though the assumption of an
increased risk acceptance under fatigue could not be verified. The results rather
show that physical and mental strains lead to a decrease of situational risk
acceptance in a virtual setting. In a real setting, physical fatigue did not influence
risk acceptance. In accordance with the results in the virtual setting, mental fatigue
leads to a decrease of willingness to take risks in the real setting as well.
It can be assumed that the results of the reality oriented experiment in particular
can be applied to everyday life. With regard to the overall results it can be said that
the main factor triggering accidents is not only to be seen in a limitation of
performance due to fatigue. Apparently, the situational risk acceptance of a person
is also relevant. Mental fatigue seems to lead to more careful behavior in sports
and activity as the situational willingness to take risks is decreased. Physical
fatigue did not have a “protective” influence.