(Press-News.org) Sex differences in risk seeking behaviour, emergency hospital admissions, and mortality are well documented. Males are more likely to be admitted to an emergency department after accidential injuries, more likely to be admitted with a sporting injury, and more likely to be involved in a fatal road traffic collision.
However, little is known about sex differences in idiotic risk taking behaviour. So researchers in north east England decided to test "male idiot theory" (MIT) that many of the differences in risk seeking behaviour may be explained by the observation that men are idiots and idiots do stupid things.
They reviewed data on idiotic behaviours demonstrated by winners of the Darwin Award over a 20 year period (1995 to 2014), noting the sex of the winner. To qualify, nominees must improve the gene pool by eliminating themselves from the human race using astonishingly stupid methods.
Worthy candidates include a man stealing a ride home by hitching a shopping trolley to the back of a train, only to be dragged two miles to his death before the train was able to stop; and the terrorist who posted a letter bomb with insufficient postage stamps and who, on its return, unthinkingly opened his own letter.
Of the 413 Darwin Award nominations, 332 were independently verified and confirmed by the Darwin Awards Committee. Of these, 14 were shared by male and female nominees - usually overly adventurous couples in compromising positions - leaving 318 valid cases for statistical testing.
Of these 318 cases, 282 Darwin Awards were awarded to males, and just 36 awards given to females. Males thus made up 88.7% of Darwin Award winners, and this sex difference is highly statistically significant, say the authors.
This finding is entirely consistent with male idiot theory (MIT) and supports the hypothesis that men are idiots and idiots do stupid things.
However, this study has limitations, add the authors. For example, women may be more likely to nominate men for a Darwin Award or the sex difference may reflect differences in alcohol use between men and women.
Despite this, it is puzzling that males are willing to take such unnecessary risks - simply as a rite of passage, in pursuit of male social esteem, or solely in exchange for "bragging rights," say the authors.
They believe male idiot theory deserves further investigation, and, "with the festive season upon us, we intend to follow up with observational field studies and an experimental study - males and females, with and without alcohol - in a semi-naturalistic Christmas party setting," they conclude.
INFORMATION:
In fact, political centrists would do well to stop 'sitting on the fence' and boost their physical activity levels to improve their health, say the researchers.
The term "armchair socialist" was coined in the 19th century by German economists who scoffed at academics advocating social policy, dubbing them "socialists of the chair" (Kathedersozialisten).
The term has since evolved to describe middle class people who talk a lot about politics but who aren't politically active in any way, and fail to "walk the talk."
The concept has been widely adopted, prompting several ...
Fed up with complaints about the lack of up to date magazines in the waiting room of his general practice, Professor Bruce Arroll and colleagues set out to answer the question. Their findings are published in the Christmas issue of The BMJ.
A total of 87 magazines were stacked into three mixed piles and placed in the waiting room of a general practice in Auckland, New Zealand. They included non-gossipy magazines (Time magazine, the Economist, Australian Women's Weekly, National Geographic, BBC History) and gossipy ones (defined as having five or more photographs of celebrities ...
Inspired by the story of King Canute - the 11th century king who tried to command the tide to turn back - Westgate Medical Practice in Dundee decided to stop fighting the tide and let patients have appointments when they wanted. Their findings are published in the Christmas issue of The BMJ.
Each morning, all patients telephoning for soon, immediate, or urgent care were invited to attend a daily appointment "pool" at 10.30am.
Reception staff invited patients, if they wished, to state the clinical problem and which GP they normally saw. Patients were advised that they ...
Highlights
In patients on dialysis, cinacalcet reduced the rate of bone fracture by 16% to 29%, after accounting for patient characteristics and other factors.
Washington, DC (December 11, 2014) -- A drug that mimics calcium and lowers parathyroid levels may help prevent bone fractures in patients with kidney failure who are on dialysis, according to a study appearing in an upcoming issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN).
Patients with kidney failure who are undergoing dialysis have an increased risk of bone fractures, and the risk of ...
Stroke is Australia's second biggest killer after coronary heart disease, but rates of a common type of stroke, intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH), appear to be falling, according to a UNSW study that is the largest of its kind in Australia.
ICH accounts for about 15% of all strokes. Close to 40% of patients will die within 30 days and significant disability is common in survivors.
The improvement in the incidence of ICH may be the result of the widespread implementation of proven prevention and treatment programs, the researchers say.
The large retrospective, observational ...
The most ambitious genetic study ever undertaken on bird evolution has found that almost all modern birds diversified after the dinosaurs became extinct 66 million years ago.
"The popular view until now has been that the extraordinary diversity of birds began during the dinosaur age but we found little support for this," said Associate Professor Simon Ho, from the University of Sydney who led a major component of the research looking at evolutionary timescale.
An international collaboration of scientists worked for four years to sequence, assemble and compare the ...
People with a high level of education who complain about memory lapses have a higher risk for stroke, according to new research in the American Heart Association journal Stroke.
"Studies have shown how stroke causes memory complaints," said Arfan Ikram, M.D., associate professor of neuroepidemiology at Erasmus University Rotterdam in The Netherlands. "Given the shared underlying vascular pathology, we posed the reverse question: 'Do memory complaints indicate an increased risk of strokes?'"
As part of the Rotterdam Study (1990-93 and 2000-01), 9,152 participants 55 ...
Children with public insurance waited longer after initial evaluation for sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) to undergo polysomnography (PSG, the gold standard diagnostic test) and also waited longer after PSG to have surgery to treat the condition with adenotonsillectomy (AT) compared with children who were privately insured, according to a report published online by JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery.
Low socioeconomic status (SES) is a barrier to quality care and improved health outcomes. SDB is a spectrum of sleep disruption that ranges from snoring to obstructive ...
EAST LANSING, Mich. - It's well known that chemotherapy helps fight cancer. It's also known that it wreaks havoc on normal, healthy cells.
Michigan State University scientists are closer to discovering a possible way to boost healthy cell production in cancer patients as they receive chemotherapy. By adding thymine - a natural building block found in DNA - into normal cells, they found it stimulated gene production and caused them to multiply.
The study can be found online in the journal Molecular Cell.
"In most cases, cancer patients who receive chemotherapy lose ...
MADISON, Wis. -- Frederick Crane was a researcher under David E. Green in the mid-1950s, during the early days of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Enzyme Institute, when he made his defining discovery.
The lab group was on a mission to determine, bit by bit, how mitochondria -- the power plants of cells -- generate the energy required to sustain life. What Crane found, a compound called coenzyme Q, was a missing piece of the puzzle and became a major part of the legacy of mitochondrial research at UW-Madison. But it was no accident.
"It was the result of a long ...
