For one who has a low probability of meeting his potential (genetic); if he realizes this and places much value on himself, he will live incautiously, as virtually his only chance at one day approaching that potential.
For one who has a low probability of meeting his potential; if he doesn't realizes this and/or doesn't places much value on himself, he may or may not live uncautiously.
For one who has a high probability of meeting his potential; if he realizes this and places much value on himself, he will live cautiously, so as to be unnecessarily reckless.
For one who has a high probability of meeting his potential; if he doesn't realizes this and/or places little value on himself, he may live or may not live cautiously.
Perhaps, despite not having an explicit knowledge of their potential or their probability of meeting it, many often have some form of intuitive knowledge of this, which makes them approach this issue as if they did have that explicit knowledge. There may have evolved in animals and later people, an instinct towards evaluating how far their phenotype is from meeting the average phenotype as was produced by their past kin.
It would be a form of fight/flight in a very broad sense of an animal's life. A certain restlessness or lack thereof, relating to whether they have or haven't developed physically and mentally (intelligence, maturity) as is natural for them to.
This is of course not referring to forms of potential is areas such as breeding, territory, allies and power, where the dynamic of drive and rest is more obvious.