But beware, as just two paracetamol tablets (1,000 mg) could turn someone into more of a risk-taker, a study suggests.
Researchers asked 189 participants to rate the risk involved in situations including skydiving, bungee jumping, and starting a new career in their thirties.
People who had been given paracetamol beforehand saw these activities as less dangerous than those who were given an inert powder as a placebo.
They were also more at ease with the idea of risking a day’s wages to bet on a horse race.
Dr Baldwin Way, lead author of the study from Ohio State University, said: ‘Although long thought to just influence our pain, it has recently been realised that paracetamol also influences our emotions and thus our risk-taking.
‘It should be emphasised that it doesn’t turn us into daredevils - it likely influences us a bit towards the riskier choice in some contexts.’
Paracetamol, used to treat pain and fever, is one of the most commonly taken drugs, and is also used in more than 600 medicines.
To see how it might affect people’s perception of risk, researchers did three experiments with 545 people.
In the first experiment people were asked to rate the riskiness of things like pesticides and nuclear power stations, with those on paracetamol not answering much differently.
But in the second experiment, when 189 people were asked about the danger of doing things in their own lives, those taking paracetamol appeared much less risk-averse.
They rated activities including taking a skydiving class, starting a new career in their thirties and walking home alone at night in an unsafe area of town as less risky.
Social risks, and recreational risks like bungee jumping, seemed to alarm people on paracetamol less than they did people given a decoy powder drink.
Those who had taken the painkillers saw financial risks as slightly less scary too.
The study, published in the journal journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, also asked people to play a computer game in which they blew up a balloon.
They earned a small cash reward with each puff, which they could bank at any time, but if they kept going and the balloon burst, they could lose all their money.
'As you're pumping the balloon, it is getting bigger and bigger on your computer screen, and you're earning more money with each pump,' Dr Way said.
'But as it gets bigger you have this decision to make: Should I keep pumping and see if I can make more money, knowing that if it bursts I lose the money I had made with that balloon?'
Results for this were variable, but one experiment with 142 people showed those on paracetamol were willing to keep risking their virtual money for longer.
'If you're risk-averse, you may pump a few times and then decide to cash out because you don't want the balloon to burst and lose your money,' said Way.