People definitely stop reading after the first answer, especially if it looks like a reasonable solution. It is a very common experience for me, where I won't realise that there is a much better rated answer below the accepted one, especially if the top answer is long enough so that the second one isn't visible without scrolling.

From a UX perspective, you want to put the most relevant information at the top. The votes of all Stack Overflow users gives a far greater signal than the one 'accepted' flag from the asker.

This is one of my biggest pain points with Stack Overflow.