Does seminar culture incentivize narrow research and theses in grad students?

I was at a workshop recently and a grad student presented a paper with a genuinely interesting, ambitious question and impressive data. They got absolutely hammered — faculty and other students piling on with questions from every angle. Constantly interrupted and disrupting the flow of the student. The student was clearly overwhelmed and flustered by the end.

Contrast that with job market talks I attended last year. I was struck by how boring most of the candidates' papers were. Maybe it's because I'm in applied, but they were very narrow, derivative questions. Very polished presentations that anticipated most objections, but still boring. The seminars went smoothly — a couple of clarifying questions, polite nods, done. Most of the audience wasn't really engaged.

Obviously the point of a seminar is to give feedback, and some of the questions the first student got were genuinely useful. But it strikes me that the lesson grad students internalize from watching this dynamic play out is: don't swing big. Pick a narrow question where you can anticipate every objection and have a backup slide for, rather than an ambitious one where the attack surface is too large to defend in real time.