On July 4th, Are You A Thrill- Or Chill-Seeker?
Short Wave
NPR
4.7 • 6K Ratings
🗓️ 1 July 2025
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A) first in line to light them
B) content to watch while others set them off
C) going to find a fire extinguisher — just in case — while loudly condemning the activity?
Ken Carter, a psychologist at Oxford College of Emory University, says everyone has a different level of sensation-seeking. This episode, we get into the factors at play, like people's brain chemistry, when deciding whether or not to do an activity, like setting off fireworks. Plus, he and Emily reveal their scores to his forty-point scale.
Ken's 40-point sensation seeking survey can be found in his book, Buzz!.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | grab a snack, make the bed, check your mail, or catch up on the latest news with the NPR News Now podcast. Listen in the time it takes you to do any of those other activities or while doing them. We bring you the stories you need to know in just five minutes, every hour of every day. Listen now to the NPR News Now podcast. You're listening to Shortwave |
| 0:25.9 | from NPR. As a kid on the 4th of July, Ken Carter's family would always get together, |
| 0:34.6 | have a picnic, and light fireworks. His brother loved that part. |
| 0:39.0 | Ken, not so much. I remember sort of thinking about, like, what I would do if something went |
| 0:45.1 | wrong, like, where the emergency room was going to be, hoping I wasn't going to blow my hand up, |
| 0:52.1 | that kind of stuff. I was a very cautious kid. |
| 0:55.0 | Ken is a clinical psychologist at Oxford College of Emory University, |
| 0:59.2 | where he studies sensation seekers, people who may enjoy risk, thrill, or a new sensation. |
| 1:05.9 | The types who on the 4th of July... |
| 1:08.0 | ...have probably driven across state lines to buy fireworks that might not be legal in your current |
| 1:14.2 | state, looking for the largest explosions, the most beautiful colors, and have invited the |
| 1:20.9 | neighborhood people over to their house to witness that. |
| 1:24.4 | Ken, by comparison, is a self-described chill seeker, the types of people who are |
| 1:30.2 | looking at the fireworks, wondering whether or not those are legal in this state and being prepared. |
| 1:36.8 | The kind of people who might bring something to put out the fire. Most people, Ken says, |
| 1:42.2 | are probably in the middle. We're going to enjoy it, |
| 1:44.6 | but may be nervous every now and then. And this spectrum of personality on display as fireworks |
| 1:50.9 | burst overhead has always intrigued him. I've always been amazed how two people can have the same |
| 1:57.4 | experience, but kind of have a different emotional reaction from it. |
| 2:01.5 | As a psychologist, Ken uses a 40-point scale to measure someone's sensation-seeking behavior. |
| 2:07.5 | And he has met people who score 38, even 40. |
| 2:10.6 | I'm actually at an 8 out of 40. |
... |
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