Over on the T Nation Instagram page, we asked our fans several questions related to anabolic steroids and other drugs. The results were pretty interesting:
Oddly, this poll triggered the nastiest debates in the comments. The most common comment was, "The 77% are liars!"
But why lie in an anonymous poll? Perhaps those with their panties in the twist assumed that following a site called "T" Nation meant that you used steroids. Strange because, last we checked, testosterone was a natural hormone produced by both men and women – an awesome hormone that we write a lot about, usually outside the context of injecting it in copious amounts.
Or maybe the 23% who do use have developed a psychological bias. They assume other people are doing or thinking what they're doing or thinking. This is called the "false-consensus effect" in psychology.
Related surveys have shown that the majority of bodybuilding magazine and website readers don't use steroids and related drugs. They just want the lifting and nutrition information.
But then things got interesting with this poll:
Although the previous poll was full of the usual folks yelling about "cheating" and "tiny balls," it seems that more than half of respondents would use steroids themselves if the legal risks were removed. Hmm....