Behavioral Expressions and Biosocial Bases of Sensation Seeking

This book is about a trait describing variations in the universal need for novel and intense stimulation and its expressions in various risky kinds of behaviour (including driving habits, health, gambling, financial risk, alcohol and drug use and abuse, sexual behaviour, and sports). Sensation seeking is also important in preferences for various vocations, media forms and content, food, humour and social attitudes. Compatibility in the trait influences premarital and marital relationship satisfaction. Its modes of assessment, behavioural expressions, and genetic and psychobiological bases are described by one of the leading researchers in this field. This book presents the only available study of this fascinating topic and it will be sure to interest researchers and their students active in personality research.

• Analyzes why and how people seek intense sensations • The only book available on this topic • Leading researcher on this subject. This will be the most important book on the subject for the next 15 years

1. Theory through 1979; 2. Test development; 3. Sensation seeking in relation to other dimensions of personality; 4. Demographic data; 5. Risk taking; 6. Sports and vocations; 7. Social, sexual, and marital relationships; 8. Vicarious experience: art, media, music, fantasy, and humour; 9. Smoking, drinking, drugs, and eating; 10. Psychopathology and stress; 11. Biological bases; 12. Psychophysiology; 13. Information processing, cognitive styles, intelligence and creativity; 14. New theoretical models; References.