Extreme Psychology

Changing a Paradigm: An Alternative Theory of Extreme Sport Psychology

A sensation-seeking basis for extreme sports participation has some holes in it that Eric Brymer hopes to rip wide open. Most research that examines the connection between extreme sports and sensation-seeking has used Zuckerman’s self-reporting survey. Usually only the highest 25 percent of sensation-seekers are used in these studies, biasing the research toward sensation-seeking from the start. This often limits the study group to young males in their teens and early twenties — individuals who statistically take higher risks, while ignoring the motivations of the broader extreme sports community, which ranges in age from teenagers on up to women and men in their 50s and 60s.

One of the difficulties in studying extreme sports has been the definition — which sports should be included and what extreme really means. Skateboarding, bungee jumping and rock climbing are three sports with very different outcomes that traditionally fall under the extreme sports umbrella. For example, rock climbing can be done in an extreme or non-extreme matter. “But in the extreme sports literature, climbing is just climbing, there’s no differentiation of whether you’re climbing without ropes at a high level or with ropes at a low level,” says Brymer. Because of this ambiguity, Brymer classifies extreme sports narrowly in his research as sports in which the negative outcomes of a mistake could be severe injury or death.

Extreme activities must also fit the traditional definition of sport — a physical activity that requires skill, usually gained through practice. This might eliminate a risky pursuit such as bungee jumping, where just about any tourist can get strapped in and jump off a bridge or a tower for the right price — no skill involved.

Brymer and others are throwing out preconception — extreme sports psychologists traditionally haven’t made such distinctions — and going beyond the stereotypical young male, sensation-seeking, adrenaline junkie to inquire into the experiences of a wide range of extreme sport participants. They are borrowing a method, traditionally used by philosophers, called phenomenology. In Greek it means, “to study that which appears.” Brymer is doing just that, cataloging the personal experiences of extreme athletes in their own words to get at the crux of their potentially dangerous endeavors.

“You have to suspend your judgment,” says Carla Willig, a psychologist at the City University of London. “You just can’t start out by saying, ‘my god, what’s wrong with these people?’” Willig has also used phenomenology to better understand why people do risky things, and along with Brymer, has now applied it to identify a number of themes common to most extreme athletes’ experiences.

One question guided Brymer’s interviews and analyses: “How is the extreme sport experience perceived by participants?” Certain themes emerged, such as courage and humility, which give rise to positive self-transformation. “At the end of the day I had an epiphany because I did not die, but really enjoyed it. A whole environment that I never knew existed was opened to me,” said a BASE jumper in his mid-forties, one of Brymer’s study subjects. “For me, it’s accepting that you’re mortal and that you’re very vulnerable,” said another one of Brymer’s BASE jumpers. The findings are published in the January 2009 issue of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology.

Life-Changing Endeavors

The participants that Brymer and Willig studied were aware of the grave dangers posed by slip-ups in their respective sports. As a whole, the extreme sports community emphasizes the importance of minimizing risk through preparing and building technical expertise and by knowing one’s limits. “The goal is always to not to get hurt,” says rock and ice climber Rich Gottlieb, who was not one of Brymer’s study subjects. The focus on minimizing risk sets these athletes apart from pure thrill seekers.

Allan Warren, 28, a whitewater kayaker from Alaska who has conquered Class V rapids — fast rivers with large waves that require expert skill level to maneuver — acknowledges that what he does might look crazy, from an outsider’s perspective, but insists that he knows exactly what he is capable of. “It’s not like I’m going out there with the intention of putting my life in danger or trying to scare the god out of myself,” he says. “It’s hard for people to understand why someone like me would want to charge down a Class V river. They don’t understand, because my skill level is beyond theirs. In order to feel challenged, this is what I have to do, this is my comfort level.”

That isn’t to say Allan Warren is never afraid.

“You can hear the rapid and even feel the rumble of it before you see it,” he says of kayaking a big, fast river like the White Nile in Uganda. “It’s intimidating. Waves rise above your head and explode over your boat – light goes in and out, your boat gets pitched around like a twig.”

When facing Class V rapids, “No Fear” just doesn’t exist, according to Warren.

“Anyone who tells you they aren’t afraid is lying — or they actually are one of those crazy people,” says Warren. “The fear is what keeps you focused.”

That fear, according to Brymer, is exactly what sets serious extreme athletes apart from your high sensation-seeking junkie. “You just wouldn’t expect a thrill seeker to feel fear,” he said. Fear also plays a role in developing courage and humility. Extreme sports participation at the level where serious injury or death is a real outcome triggers humility by putting the fragility of one’s own life into perspective.