Research may establish a genetic basis for sensation seeking and/or associate sensation seeking with neurological and physiological responsiveness. Research may relate sensation seeking to a range of behaviors, from maladaptive behaviors such as substance use and risky sex to more neutral or even adaptive behaviors such as preferences for music and art or preferences for certain careers. Issues related to research design and data analysis include whether researchers treat sensation seeking as an independent or dependent variable, use total scale versus subscale scores in analyses, treat scores as continuous or grouped variables, and consider demographic variables in their analyses.
There is a large volume of literature on sensation seeking that delineates important conceptual and operational distinctions, including several prominent measures of sensation seeking.
Sensation seeking is a biologically based personality trait that is characterized by the need to seek a variety of sensations and experiences and the willingness to take risks to achieve them.