Exactly.

I was traveling out of an airport in CA once, probably sometime around mid-2002. I was sitting next to a man and woman (age 60ish) vacationing from the UK. This was of course, during the early part of all the security hype and we were getting constantly bombarded with messages about unattended bags.

Well, being a relatively honest (perhaps somewhat naive) kid at the time I asked the lady if she would mind keeping an eye on my bag while I ran to the rest room. She answered me with "Well, I don't think I'm supposed to do that since they're telling us that no bags should be left unattended." Fast-forward 8 years and now you'll get "Sure buddy, in fact when you get back I gotta go too, that OK?"

*I'm not faulting the woman for doing what she thought was safe at the time. I'm just pointing out that when you overuse a threat it eventually becomes something that gets ignored. The same logic is used by weather offices on the Plains during tornado season. You would be surprised how much consideration is taken internally when making the decision to issue a "tornado warning" to the public. One has to be wise - if you overuse the tool, eventually deaths will result when people no longer take you seriously.