Peltzman Effect

The Peltzman effect refers to the hypothesis that implies that people react to safety regulations by increasing other risky behaviors and thus offsetting the safe behaviors. An example of this might be someone getting into a car and carefully putting on their seatbelt and adjusting the mirror, but then going out to the freeway and speeding recklessly. In this case, making sure seat belts are worn and mirrors properly adjusted create a false sense of security that lead to a false belief that speeding is not as dangerous as it really is.