As a leather-clad biker roars past you on a powerful motorcycle you might assume the rider is a teenage speed demon but in fact he is more likely to be a middle-aged family man.
DVLA statistics show that motorbike ownership amongst men of 45 is more than twenty times higher than it is amongst 25-year-olds. A huge 21,5381 of men aged 45 have a motorbike licence compared with just 10,232 of 25-year-olds.
What makes a man turn back to the risk-taking high speed thrills of his teenage years just at the time when he might be expected to be setting his sights on a quiet retirement?
For some men a motorcycle not only satisfies a long-held youthful fancy but also provides an adrenaline rush that is otherwise missing in their lives.
Dr John Maule, director of the Centre for Decision Research at the University of Leeds, specialises in risk-taking and decision-making research. He says: "The homeostasis of risk theory says that we have an optimum level of risk that we need in our lives. When that level falls we do things to bring it up again.
"As people become older their lives become more secure. They become more financially secure and socially - even if they are not married, they become more confident in their social arrangements.
"They may dip below their optimum level of risk and have to look for other things to bring back the element of risk to their life."
Maule believes that the successful career man is often also the type of person who will be attracted to the risk of motorcycle riding. "we know that men are generally more risk taking than women. Subsequent research has suggested that there may be a subset of men, who a fairly middle class and well educated, who are extreme risk takers."
What say ye to this?
