event.preventDefault() and IE

event.preventDefault() and IE

I am using jquery 1.4.1.min.js

I just discovered that event.preventDefault() causes errors under IE 8.
Thanks to Google I found this work around.

  1. if(event.preventDefault){
  2.     event.preventDefault();
  3. }else{
  4.     event.returnValue = false; 
  5. };

Is there a more elegant way to handle this?