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> You read the paragraph in that article you linked that ends with "When you do have that crash, you better have it on."? Yes, but if helmets raise your risk o

> You read the paragraph in that article you linked that ends with "When you do have that crash, you better have it on."? Yes, but if helmets raise your risk of having a crash to begin with (due to cars driving closer to you or otherwise), it's unclear whether it's better to wear one or not. (Higher risk of less destructive crashes vs. lower risk of more destructive crashes.) > All you have to do to know for sure whether helmets result in more or less net risk of injury is look at the statistics for the people who've been killed wearing helmets vs not wearing helmets. I disagree -- that's correlation, not causation. Perhaps people who wear helmets are just more careful in general. (That seems pretty likely to me.)

dahart 9y ago
> Yes, but if helmets raise your risk of having a crash to begin with That wasn't demonstrated in Walker's study. Neither correlation nor causation. > that's correlation, not causation. Perhaps people who wear helmets are just more careful in general. No, there is a lower death rate for riders given that they've been in an accident. That rules out rider behavior. Helmet wearers may have lower accident rates than non-wearers, but minor and major injuries often aren't reported, so we don't have great data on that. What we do know is that if you have an accident, your risk of death is lower if there was a helmet on your head. I'm not sure why that's surprising or debatable. It's armor, it puts shock absorbing material between colliding surfaces. It seems rather obvious it would reduce the severity of the collision. We use padding and shock absorbers and suspension systems everywhere... because they're effective. Having crashed quite a few times myself, and caused several minor and major injuries on my mountain bike, I'm pretty sure my helmet has saved me. Sometimes I wear body armor and a neck brace as well. My biking friends won't ride with me or let me ride without a helmet, and they expect the same of me. Anyway, some studies on the effectiveness of helmets have controlled specifically for rider behavior, and ruled that out as a factor in the lower death rates of helmet wearers. Here are some starting points, if you truly are genuinely unsure and want to do your own research. http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00036941.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00036941.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2598379/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2598379/

dahart 9y ago

> Yes, but if helmets raise your risk of having a crash to begin with That wasn't demonstrated in Walker's study. Neither correlation nor causation. > that's correlation, not causation. Perhaps people who wear helmets are just more careful in general. No, there is a lower death rate for riders given that they've been in an accident. That rules out rider behavior. Helmet wearers may have lower accident rates than non-wearers, but minor and major injuries often aren't reported, so we don't have great data on that. What we do know is that if you have an accident, your risk of death is lower if there was a helmet on your head. I'm not sure why that's surprising or debatable. It's armor, it puts shock absorbing material between colliding surfaces. It seems rather obvious it would reduce the severity of the collision. We use padding and shock absorbers and suspension systems everywhere... because they're effective. Having crashed quite a few times myself, and caused several minor and major injuries on my mountain bike, I'm pretty sure my helmet has saved me. Sometimes I wear body armor and a neck brace as well. My biking friends won't ride with me or let me ride without a helmet, and they expect the same of me. Anyway, some studies on the effectiveness of helmets have controlled specifically for rider behavior, and ruled that out as a factor in the lower death rates of helmet wearers. Here are some starting points, if you truly are genuinely unsure and want to do your own research. http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm http://www.bhsi.org/shouldi.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00036941.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00036941.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2598379/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2598379/