It's fun … until it isn't: Boosting and nudging for safer decisions in hazardous backcountry winter mountains

With limited regulation, how can we help individuals make autonomous, safe decisions in complex, uncertain and volatile contexts? Using backcountry skiing in Norway as a case study, we explore how aspects of soft regulatory approaches—boosts and nudges—are used to support safer decision-making in high-risk environments as a complement to formal regulation. Norway's ethos of friluftsliv and the right to roam grants recreationists significant autonomy, yet this freedom comes with risks, as human-triggered avalanches in unmanaged wilderness areas pose serious threats. We present several existing interventions, such as avalanche courses, and beacon checkpoints. We then use a behavioral science lens to identify their boosty and nudgy qualities and how they may support the seemingly incongruous practice of safe and autonomous decision-making while having fun in sometimes highly hazardous contexts. Challenges, including intervention accessibility, trust, and scalability, are discussed, and recommendations for future practice and research are offered. • An overarching approach for managing tensions inherent in complex decision-making. • Advice for policymakers – in this case for managing complex, safe, winter mountain recreation. • Illustrations of soft regulations designed to guide back-country recreationists to make safer choices. • Assessment of currently practiced soft regulations for safer backcountry recreation. • Advice for future practice in Norway and in similarly complex contexts.