Also, another thing to consider is whether there's other people around and what their gender is. Consider the scenario of me (a man) walking down the street at night and there's one person around that I need to pass by to get where I'm going.

If I'm constantly moving my head to look around at everything, I'm going to look really shady and make other people worried. I'm just trying to get somewhere, so I'd rather not bother people, which means it's better to just look ahead and kinda ignore them, and trust that my peripheral vision will pick up any actual threats.

That all being said, this experiment wasn't set up to consider that at all. Especially since the study is from Brigham Young University (ew), and at a spot on campus referred to as "Rape Hill". So thinking this much about the study is probably a waste of ti.e