Instant Reaction (revised)

    In the first month of my college year, I realized the necessity of riding a bicycle. I needed a bicycle to go to classes, and I also to ride it outside of school ground to find something for dinner. Once in a while, I ran across bicycle accidents. Therefore, I decided to observe the riders’ reactions the moment before they were about to crash into another bicycle. I was interested in the instant reactions because I have faced similar incidents before. I was curious about how people reacted in such a short time when having to decide whether to stop their bicycles or to turn to another direction to avoid crashing. A phenomenon that also attracted me was that bicyclists often become upset, mostly toward the other rider in an accident. I wanted to figure out why these emotions were stirred up.

    Through a sequence of logical inferring, I concluded two scenarios happening when bicyclists faced a probable bicycle crash. Scenario was that riders were astounded such that their minds went blank. They griped the handlebars tightly, and directly struck into the oncoming bicycle. Other was that various options for avoiding crashing popped up in riders’ mind. In that case, the riders had to address relative speed and the distance between two bikes, and opt for a resolution in a flash. Consequently, they ended up doing nothing and collide, or they just turned away the handlebars to avert direct impact. Both scenarios led to turbulence of emotion. Rage replaced astonishment as bicyclists recovered themselves. Riders would intuitively defend themselves, and defense turned out to be physical reactions, such as rash behaviors and cursing.

    The hardest parts of my observation were how to observe and how to pinpoint the observation. To have a good start, I decided to risk my life to conduct an experimental crash. I rode my bicycle on Zhou Shan Street and tried to distract myself from what I was doing. The first observation was completed when I rode down from the small bridge. I almost struck the oncoming bicycle which I couldn’t see before I rode to the top of bridge. After I stopped, I recalled what I experienced just then. When I rode down the bridge fast and saw the oncoming bike, I was shocked and went blank for almost a second. However, in a flicker of time later my brain was overwhelmed by information, which I could barely decide what to do next. I pulled the brake, and fortunately, our bicycles hit only slightly.

    After this incident, I recorded my observations. I could not be sure whether pulling the brake was the only reaction people had or were there any other possibilities. Therefore, I did another experiment on the other day. I was riding on Zhou Shan Street again after the English class dismissed but in an inverse direction. Soon, I crashed my bicycle into another cyclist. Neither of us pulled the brake, which I did it intentionally, and which I could tell from his face that he didn’t. I fell on the ground, and his front tire was over my bike. He cursed and seemed resentful at me. After he recovered himself, he left.

    The two scenarios demonstrated at the beginning were just the simplified versions of the complex human behavior. However, the two experiments gave way more interesting facts of this topic---instant reactions. People behave in sub conscience in time of emergency; the reactions can tell how a person feels and experiences, such as shouting out when one has to release stress. These reactions also indicate that physical motions and emotions are correlated. This explains why people get angry or irrational easily when they join an accident. Because at the moment riders see bicycles or other vehicles rushing toward them, they are jolted and petrified. After a crash or a close escape, adrenalin and emotions burst out at the same time that causes the riders to flare up. This is a set of chemical reactions inside one’s body that gives the person strength and stimuli to respond to an accident quickly. They also want to defend themselves over their rights in an accident. At this point, the riders often become more aggressive and agitated.

    Through my observations, I summarized that the possibility of crashing bicycles was substantial that in either scenarios both riders got hurt eventually. Human performs poorly on reacting to emergencies. This observation will go on whenever there are still cars or bicycles on the road. Hence, we should always be mentally prepared for any accident that might take place at any time.