Every day, people encounter a myriad of decisions: choosing between the stairs or the elevator, deciding whether to drive or walk, and opting to cook or order takeout.

While many of these choices may seem trivial, for some, certain decisions carry more weight and are perceived as riskier.

In Switzerland, researchers have compiled a list of the 100 most common real-life dilemmas, including life-altering decisions like switching careers, getting married, or purchasing a home. This research offers insights into the roots of contemporary anxiety.

Renato Frey, a psychologist at the University of Zurich and co-author of the study, explained, “Our primary aim was to capture people’s real-life experiences… We asked participants to report a single risky choice they faced.”

Prominent among these choices were starting a new job and resigning from a current position, with career-related decisions accounting for five of the top 25 risks. Additionally, health-related choices represented eight of the top 25 risks.

The health decisions reported were often significant and deeply personal. These included whether to undergo major surgery, adhere to medical treatment plans, engage with 5G technology, or receive vaccinations.

Health risks also included major lifestyle choices, such as starting a new diet or workout plan or engaging in dangerous sports, highlighting that these personal decisions carry significant potential for both benefit and harm. 

Furthermore, the study revealed that the weight of these health risks and associated anxiety shifts throughout a person’s life. For older populations, and particularly for women over 60, health-related risky choices became just as prevalent as work-related ones.

The health risks people cited were both deeply personal and high-stakes, including classic medical decisions like undergoing surgery as well as modern controversies like vaccinating or adopting 5G (stock image)

The new study’s population numbered more than 4,000 Swiss adults across a range of ages, so further studies would need to be conducted to determine Americans’ perceived riskiest choices assigned to different categories. 

The researchers deliberately avoided defining a ‘risky choice’ to capture two distinct types of real-world decisions: those with known but uncertain outcomes, like a game of chance, and those with completely unknown consequences, such as starting a new business.

To uncover the real-life risks that people fret about, researchers surveyed 4,380 people from the general public, ranging in age from 15 to 79.

They asked each participant to describe a single, challenging, risky choice they had personally faced or had seen others struggle with.

Researchers prompted people to recall a time they either took a risk or avoided one from either their own perspective or that of another person they knew.

The survey generated thousands of personal dilemmas, ranging from ‘Should I quit my job?’ to ‘Should I get this surgery?’

Using a multi-stage process, researchers systematically grouped similar responses to build a final, data-driven inventory of the 100 most prevalent risky choices. 

Researchers visualized the most common risks using word clouds. The biggest, most prominent words were dilemmas like ‘job change,’ ‘quit job,’ and ‘invest money,’ while less frequent risks appeared in smaller text around them. 

The top answers were relatively uniform across the population studied, but researchers uncovered certain differences when they zoomed in on specific groups.

People’s ages and genders significantly influenced which risks they believed were the most significant.

The researchers created a ‘Top 25’ list of the most common life dilemmas people face. They calculated the average age of the people who mentioned each risk and identified the primary life domain (like Work, Health, or Money) that each risk falls into

Researchers created word clouds with the six most frequently reported risky choices

The career dilemma of ‘Should I quit my job?’ became less common with age for both men and women, while ‘Should I accept a new job?’ remained a top concern among younger adults.

Men 60 and up frequently fretted about possible health effects of using 5G, while those 30 to 44 were concerned about getting surgery and considering travel. These choices did not appear among the top five most frequent choices for women. 

Women 15 to 29 and 45 to 59 frequently considered whether to pursue specific education or training, while women 30 to 44 faced the dilemma of whether to get married. These two choices did not appear in the five most frequent choices for men.

Survey participants also expressed concerns about using new technologies, including 5G, as a health risk. The study did not specify what about newly-developed technology they were most concerned about, but could refer to the use of AI in medicine, genetic testing or health wearables. 

Work-related dilemmas were the most common source of risk, making up nearly a third (32 percent) of all choices reported. Health (18 percent) and financial (17 percent) concerns followed, while social (13 percent), traffic (12 percent), and recreational (nine percent) issues rounded out the primary challenging decisions people face. 

The study also found that the notion of some people being ‘risk-takers’ and others being ‘risk-averse’ in their thoughts and behaviors may not hold up.

The findings revealed that a person’s willingness to take risks can change dramatically depending on the category of the decision.

For example, a daredevil may skydive regularly, a risk within the recreational domain, while still being very conservative and cautious with their health, such as by not taking medication.  

The study compared risk perceptions across three groups: a pre-covid baseline (lightest-colored bar), a new cross-sectional group during the pandemic (medium), and a longitudinal group (darkest) tracked from before to during Covid. The data strongly indicate the distribution of risks across categories remained fundamentally stable throughout the pandemic 

A person’s general risk tolerance was a weak predictor of their actual choices, proving that a daredevil in one part of life can be highly conservative in another. 

The researchers also tested whether a major global crisis, the Covid pandemic, fundamentally changed the types of risky choices people face. They found that it did not. 

The overall list of the top 100 life dilemmas remained largely the same.

Researchers identified several limitations to their study. The most limiting factor was that the study population hailed from Switzerland, ‘a very safe country with, for instance, a very low crime rate.’

The country also has a vastly different healthcare payment infrastructure.

Health insurance is mandatory for all in Switzerland, with a focus on universal coverage through regulated private insurers.

While the monthly premiums are a significant household expense, the system has a safety net. 

All out-of-pocket costs for the year are legally capped, meaning a major illness might strain a family’s budget, but it is very unlikely to lead to financial ruin.

In the US, meanwhile, people face the world’s highest healthcare costs. The US lacks Switzerland’s universal mandate and strict out-of-pocket limits.

Consequently, medical bills are a leading cause of personal bankruptcy in the US, a phenomenon that is virtually nonexistent in Switzerland.

The study was published in the journal Psychological Science.