Symposium Abstract
People have the amazing ability to make rapid decisions and to act quickly in rather complex situations. A lot of this ability stems from experience and expertise with similar situations. However, people are regularly confronted with yet similar, but regarding important factors different, new, or unfamiliar risky situations. People use different strategies in order to judge the risks of this kind of situation: Sometimes they still rely on their experience and expertise; other time they use they current bodily state (e.g., activity, affect) as a rule of thumb; or they use the behavior of others as a source for decision making (e.g., social norm, social proof). On the one side, these strategies are fast and easy to use. On the other side, the underlying process is often subconscious and the rational of the strategy can be inappropriate for the problem to be solved. Therefore, people, when judging the risks of less familiar situations, are prone to a variety of psychological mechanisms influencing and biasing human perception and behavior. Accordingly, the symposium focuses on different psychological aspects regarding risk estimation and risk behavior in different contexts. It aims to explore a variety of mechanism and to discuss the potential value for practical implications.