RISK ASSIGNMENT - REPORT

Karl Van Der Schueren

Axelle Caveye

Bedrijfsmanagement - Marketing
Business English 2B
Sofie Carels
2016-2017
Artevelde University College

Executive summary
This report is meant to show the result of a survey we conducted. In class we
devised a survey about risk taking. The questions were to see if students of
Artevelde University are risk takers or not. Also to see if they ever did something
risky and how they think about certain situations. We sent the survey to students of
our class by email.
Firstly, we asked some general questions to see the different types of respondents
we had, such as gender and age. The other questions are more or less closed
questions to see how big of a risk taker the surveyed is. Only 23% of the surveyed
answered with a minimum of 7 or more times out of 13 questions (or minimum 70%)
with a positive answer. Which means these people see themselves as big risk
takers?
46% of the surveyed answered negative most of the times (4 times with a yes of
less) which means that they think more about decisions and rather dont take any
risks. The other surveyed are somewhere in between and say it depends on the
situation they are in, if they take any risks or not.
In the end, we saw that it would be better if we had sent the survey to more people
so we could have more varied responses. Also the results arent very representative
because of the small group of respondents. All the questions we ask and the results
of the survey are written down below in the document.

1. Introduction
Risk-taking can be defined as the act or fact of doing something that involves
danger or risk in order to achieve a goal. Adolescence is a time when youth make
decisions, both good and bad, that have consequences for the rest of their lives.
Some of these decisions put them at risk of lifelong health problems, injury, or
death.
Dr. Andreas Wilke, a well-respected American professor in psychology, already
published dozens of articles about this matter. Rather than being generally riskseeking or risk-avoiding, people are a complicated blend, as explained by Dr. Wilke
in an article by Life Science. "A person might be risk-seeking in a recreational risk
way. But that person may be risk-averse in financial situations. They would do
bungee jumping but wouldn't invest in the stock market." Likewise, a financially
reckless person who is willing to wager everything in a game of blackjack might
never attempt a controversial joke in a conversation with strangers. (Wilke, 2011)
To confirm the hypothesis stated by Andreas Wilke, we conducted a survey to
analyze the kind of risk-takers in our class. Are they financial risk-takers? Do they
take risks with relationships? Is risk-taking common in certain age groups? Is risktaking more dominant according to gender? These were all statements we wanted to
investigate in our survey.
And so, our survey was created with Google Forms. We chose this tool because it is
very accessible and user-friendly. The program makes graphs and table by itself for
better analysis of the responses. We could easily monitor the responses and do our
risk-assessments.
In our brainstorm prior to the survey, we hypothesized that men would be bigger
risk-takers on most levels. Women are, according to us, more cautious with risks and
are less impulsive in general. But keeping the opinion of Dr. Wilke in mind, there
could be deviations on our assumption. Young adolescents are not generally riskseeking or risk-avoiding, but a peculiar blend of both. The survey is initiated to
answer clarify these assumptions.
This report starts out by demonstrating the questions we asked to our class. Next,
the results of the individual responses are shown in a well-arranged table. We then
try to explain the given answers, illustrated by tables and graphs. We end this report
by concluding our findings and give some recommendations. Our appendices and
references are enclosed at the end of our report.
Sadly, our survey was rather limited by the number of peers in our class group. The
ratio between men and women was also not equally divided. We cannot give general
conclusions of all people because these would simply not be representative! Please
keep this in mind while reading our conclusion and recommendations.

2. Findings and discussion

2.1.

Overview questions

2.2.

Individual answers

2.3.

Overview answers

Of our total respondents, 76.9% is female and the rest, 23.1%, is male. We have so
many female respondents because there are only a few guys in our class. If we
would do this survey on a bigger scale, the difference between female and male
respondents wouldnt be so big.

Here you can see what age our respondents are. The bigger group are at the age of
20. You can also see that we accidentally added the age 24 twice in this question.
With this question we can see in the end which age group is taking more risk than
another age.

This question is the first one of the yes/no questions to see in the end who is the
biggest risktaker. Only 15.4% of the surveyed has been to a casino to gamble.
Maybe the other group never had the chance of going in, because of the minimum
age of 21.

With this question who cant see anything special. Half of the group answered yes
and the other half no.

Most people think having unprotected seks is the most risky thing to do. The
percentages that think smoking and drinking alcohol is most risky is about the same.

This question could have been clearer if we had asked if they would ever hitchhike.
The people who said no (84%) maybe never had the chance before to do it, but
would definitelydo it alone.

Most of the people answered no on this question, which is normal I guess on our
age.

With this question the percentages of both answers are again almost the same.

This is a clear question to know if someone is a risktaker or not. The percentage of

people who sais yes is also pretty low so it is easier to so at the end who are the few
risktakers of the total group of respondents.

Here, the answers are again very divided. But we can say that the people who said
no, are most likely no risktakers.

Most of the people answered no here. Here, it is also easier to so at the end who is a
risktaker because of the small group who said yes.

70% said that they never have travelled alone. Maybe they didnt had the chance to
do it or they are scared so they would never do it alone.

3 out of 4 of the respondents have ever exceeded the speed limit. I think that is
quite normal you sometimes drive faster than the alowed limit, even if it is by
accident.

Only a small group (23%) said they smoke cigarettes. But also people who doesnt
smoke can a risktaker, so this question isnt very clear.

This question can be different for a lot of people due to the amount of free time
during a week. But because our class have an overall same weekshedule, there is
still a big difference in answers. 8% say they never drink alcohol during the week
while other say they drink more than 13 glasses in 1 week. There is also a difference
between girls drinking and boys.

Conclusion

We have 2 big risk takers and 2 who never did something risky. We see that being a risktaker or not being a risktaker
doesnt have anything to do with age and gender. Ofcourse with only 13 participants in this survey this survey isnt a
correct research and isnt representative. If we would do this survey on a bigger scale it would be easier to know what
a person makes a risktaker or not.

3. Recommendations
We based our survey on different aspects on risks. Risks can be taken in any
aspect of a persons life. Health risks, educational risks, relational risks, legal
risks, safety risks and economic risks were all gauged in the survey. Our peers
could answer these questions with yes/no, or a list of possible answers.
It would be recommended to do a sort like survey on a bigger audience to be
more representative. More surveys should be taken to have a more elaborate
conclusion. In this scenario, 498 students would have to fill in the survey. That
way, we would be 99% sure about our findings and we could have a clearer
result. (Alles over martonderzoek, 2016) It is calculated that around 2000
students (Artevelde Hogeschool, 2015) study management courses at Artevelde,
so 1 out of 4 students would have to fill in the survey.
If all students of Artevelde Business Management would be the target group of
our survey, we would ask a minimum of 2 questions per aspect of risk mentioned
above. That way, we would have a clearer view of risk takers studying at
Artevelde. Open-ended questions should be asked to get into the mindset of our
fellow students. That way we can understand their behavior towards risk more.
The adjusted survey for the whole student body of Artevelde can be found below,
in the back matter.

3.1.

Back Matter

3.2.

References

1. Wilke, A. (2011, August 30). Live Science. Retrieved from Live Science:
http://www.livescience.com/33471-people-take-risks.html
2. Artvelde Hogeschool. (2017, September 17). Persbericht inschrijvingscijfers.
Retrieved from Artevelde Hogeschool:
https://www.arteveldehogeschool.be/nieuwsopinie/persbericht/inschrijvingscijfers-aan-de-arteveldehogeschool-trends
3. Alles over martonderzoek. (2016). AOM steekproefcalculator. Retrieved from Alles
Over Marktonderzoek: http://www.allesovermarktonderzoek.nl/steekproefalgemeen/steekproefcalculator#Depopulairstesteekproefcalculatorvannederla
nd