IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp13451.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Preferences across Generations and Family Clusters: A Large-Scale Experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Chowdhury, Shyamal

    (University of Sydney)

  • Sutter, Matthias

    (Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods)

  • Zimmermann, Klaus F.

    (University of Bonn)

Abstract

Economic preferences are important for lifetime outcomes such as educational achievements, health status, or labor market success. We present a holistic view of how economic preferences are related within families. In an experiment with 544 families (and 1,999 individuals) from rural Bangladesh we find a large degree of intergenerational persistence of economic preferences. Both mothers' and fathers' risk, time and social preferences are significantly (and largely to the same degree) positively correlated with their children's economic preferences, even when controlling for personality traits and socio-economic background data. We discuss possible transmission channels for these relationships within families and find indications that there is more than pure genetics at work. Moving beyond an individual level analysis, we are the first to classify a whole family into one of two clusters, with either relatively patient, risktolerant and pro-social members or relatively impatient, risk averse and spiteful members. Socio-economic background variables correlate with the cluster to which a family belongs to.

Suggested Citation

  • Chowdhury, Shyamal & Sutter, Matthias & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2020. "Economic Preferences across Generations and Family Clusters: A Large-Scale Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 13451, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13451
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp13451.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bart H.H. Golsteyn & Hans Grönqvist & Lena Lindahl, 2014. "Adolescent Time Preferences Predict Lifetime Outcomes," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(580), pages 739-761, November.
    2. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2010. "Are Risk Aversion and Impatience Related to Cognitive Ability?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 1238-1260, June.
    3. Ben-Ner, Avner & List, John A. & Putterman, Louis & Samek, Anya, 2017. "Learned generosity? An artefactual field experiment with parents and their children," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 28-44.
    4. Mahanta, Ratul & Chowdhury, Jayashree & Nath, Hiranya K., 2016. "Health costs of arsenic contamination of drinking water in Assam, India," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 30-42.
    5. David Cesarini & Magnus Johannesson & Paul Lichtenstein & Örjan Sandewall & Björn Wallace, 2010. "Genetic Variation in Financial Decision‐Making," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(5), pages 1725-1754, October.
    6. Fabian Kosse & Thomas Deckers & Pia Pinger & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch & Armin Falk, 2020. "The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(2), pages 434-467.
    7. Oriana Bandiera & Iwan Barankay & Imran Rasul, 2005. "Social Preferences and the Response to Incentives: Evidence from Personnel Data," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(3), pages 917-962.
    8. Kosse, Fabian & Pfeiffer, Friedhelm, 2012. "Impatience among preschool children and their mothers," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 115(3), pages 493-495.
    9. Matthias Sutter & Martin G. Kocher & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Stefan T. Trautmann, 2013. "Impatience and Uncertainty: Experimental Decisions Predict Adolescents' Field Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(1), pages 510-531, February.
    10. Hans P. Binswanger, 1980. "Attitudes Toward Risk: Experimental Measurement in Rural India," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 62(3), pages 395-407.
    11. André Palma & Nathalie Picard & Anthony Ziegelmeyer, 2011. "Individual and couple decision behavior under risk: evidence on the dynamics of power balance," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 70(1), pages 45-64, January.
    12. Alberto Bisin & Thierry Verdier, 2000. ""Beyond the Melting Pot": Cultural Transmission, Marriage, and the Evolution of Ethnic and Religious Traits," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(3), pages 955-988.
    13. Ingvild Almås & Alexander W. Cappelen & Kjell G. Salvanes & Erik Ø. Sørensen & Bertil Tungodden, 2016. "Willingness to Compete: Family Matters," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(8), pages 2149-2162, August.
    14. Caliendo, Marco & Fossen, Frank & Kritikos, Alexander, 2012. "Trust, positive reciprocity, and negative reciprocity: Do these traits impact entrepreneurial dynamics?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 394-409.
    15. Leandro S. Carvalho & Stephan Meier & Stephanie W. Wang, 2016. "Poverty and Economic Decision-Making: Evidence from Changes in Financial Resources at Payday," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(2), pages 260-284, February.
    16. Lex Borghans & Angela Lee Duckworth & James J. Heckman & Bas ter Weel, 2008. "The Economics and Psychology of Personality Traits," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 43(4).
    17. Christopher Chabris & David Laibson & Carrie Morris & Jonathon Schuldt & Dmitry Taubinsky, 2008. "Individual laboratory-measured discount rates predict field behavior," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 237-269, December.
    18. Zimmermann, Klaus F. & Krause, Annabelle & Chowdhury, Shyamal, 2015. "Arsenic Contamination of Drinking Water and Mental Health," CEPR Discussion Papers 10978, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    19. Shaohua Chien & Martin Ravallion, 2001. "How did the world's poorest fare in the 1990s?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 47(3), pages 283-300, September.
    20. Henrik Cronqvist & Stephan Siegel, 2015. "The Origins of Savings Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 123(1), pages 123-169.
    21. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde & Jürgen Schupp & Gert G. Wagner, 2011. "Individual Risk Attitudes: Measurement, Determinants, And Behavioral Consequences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 522-550, June.
    22. Sabine Weinert (Koord.) & Jens B. Asendorpf & Andreas Beelmann & Hildegard Doil & Sabine Frevert & Arnold Lohaus & Marcus Hasselhorn, 2007. "Expertise zur Erfassung von psychologischen Personmerkmalen bei Kindern im Alter von fünf Jahren im Rahmen des SOEP," Data Documentation 20, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    23. Carlsson, Fredrik & He, Haoran & Martinsson, Peter & Qin, Ping & Sutter, Matthias, 2012. "Household decision making in rural China: Using experiments to estimate the influences of spouses," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 84(2), pages 525-536.
    24. Raymundo M. Campos-Vazquez, 2018. "Intergenerational Persistence of Skills and Socioeconomic Status," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 39(3), pages 509-523, September.
    25. Michal Bauer & Julie Chytilova & Jonathan Morduch, 2012. "Behavioral Foundations of Microcredit: Experimental and Survey Evidence from Rural India," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(2), pages 1118-1139, April.
    26. Philipp M.A. Hübler, 2018. "Heritability of Time Preference: Evidence from German Twin Data," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 71(3), pages 433-455, August.
    27. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David B. Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2017. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," NBER Working Papers 23943, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    28. Michal Bauer & Julie Chytilová & Barbara Pertold-Gebicka, 2014. "Parental background and other-regarding preferences in children," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 17(1), pages 24-46, March.
    29. James J. Heckman & Jora Stixrud & Sergio Urzua, 2006. "The Effects of Cognitive and Noncognitive Abilities on Labor Market Outcomes and Social Behavior," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(3), pages 411-482, July.
    30. Attila Ambrus & Erica Field & Maximo Torero, 2010. "Muslim Family Law, Prenuptial Agreements, and the Emergence of Dowry in Bangladesh," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(3), pages 1349-1397.
    31. Matthias Doepke & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2017. "Parenting With Style: Altruism and Paternalism in Intergenerational Preference Transmission," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 1331-1371, September.
    32. Fredrik Carlsson & Peter Martinsson & Ping Qin & Matthias Sutter, 2013. "The influence of spouses on household decision making under risk: an experiment in rural China," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 16(3), pages 383-401, September.
    33. Oriana Bandiera & Iwan Barankay & Imran Rasul, 2010. "Social Incentives in the Workplace," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(2), pages 417-458.
    34. Barnea, Amir & Cronqvist, Henrik & Siegel, Stephan, 2010. "Nature or nurture: What determines investor behavior?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(3), pages 583-604, December.
    35. Cipriani, Marco & Giuliano, Paola & Jeanne, Olivier, 2013. "Like mother like son? Experimental evidence on the transmission of values from parents to children," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 100-111.
    36. David J. Deming, 2017. "The Growing Importance of Social Skills in the Labor Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(4), pages 1593-1640.
    37. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2018. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 1645-1692.
    38. Bettinger, Eric & Slonim, Robert, 2007. "Patience among children," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1-2), pages 343-363, February.
    39. Alessandro Cigno & Mizuki Komura & Annalisa Luporini, 2017. "Self-enforcing family rules, marriage and the (non)neutrality of public intervention," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 30(3), pages 805-834, July.
    40. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2012. "The Intergenerational Transmission of Risk and Trust Attitudes," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(2), pages 645-677.
    41. Damian Clarke & Joseph P. Romano & Michael Wolf, 2020. "The Romano–Wolf multiple-hypothesis correction in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 20(4), pages 812-843, December.
    42. Ian Bateman & Alistair Munro, 2005. "An Experiment on Risky Choice Amongst Households," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(502), pages 176-189, March.
    43. Miles S. Kimball & Claudia R. Sahm & Matthew D. Shapiro, 2009. "Risk Preferences in the PSID: Individual Imputations and Family Covariation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 363-368, May.
    44. Sutter, Matthias & Zoller, Claudia & Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela, 2019. "Economic behavior of children and adolescents – A first survey of experimental economics results," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 98-121.
    45. Filippetti, Andrea & Vezzani, Antonio, 2022. "The political economy of public research, or why some governments commit to research more than others," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    46. David Cesarini & Christopher T. Dawes & Magnus Johannesson & Paul Lichtenstein & Björn Wallace, 2009. "Genetic Variation in Preferences for Giving and Risk Taking," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(2), pages 809-842.
    47. Alan, Sule & Baydar, Nazli & Boneva, Teodora & Crossley, Thomas F. & Ertac, Seda, 2017. "Transmission of risk preferences from mothers to daughters," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 60-77.
    48. Castillo, Marco & Jordan, Jeffrey L. & Petrie, Ragan, 2018. "Children’s rationality, risk attitudes and field behavior," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 62-81.
    49. Sule Alan & Seda Ertac, 2018. "Fostering Patience in the Classroom: Results from Randomized Educational Intervention," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(5), pages 1865-1911.
    50. Jonathan P. Beauchamp & David Cesarini & Magnus Johannesson, 2017. "The psychometric and empirical properties of measures of risk preferences," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 54(3), pages 203-237, June.
    51. Richard Karlsson Linnér & Pietro Biroli & Edward Kong & S. Fleur W. Meddens & Robee Wedow & Mark Alan Fontana & Maël Lebreton & Abdel Abdellaoui & Anke R. Hammerschlag & Michel G. Nivard & Aysu Okba, 2018. "Genome-wide association analyses of risk tolerance and risky behaviors in over one million individuals identify hundreds of loci and shared genetic influences," Working Papers 2018-087, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    52. Castillo, Marco & Ferraro, Paul J. & Jordan, Jeffrey L. & Petrie, Ragan, 2011. "The today and tomorrow of kids: Time preferences and educational outcomes of children," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(11), pages 1377-1385.
    53. Ernst Fehr & Helen Bernhard & Bettina Rockenbach, 2008. "Egalitarianism in young children," Nature, Nature, vol. 454(7208), pages 1079-1083, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lukas Kiessling & Shyamal Chowdhury & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch & Matthias Sutter, 2021. "Parental Paternalism and Patience," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2021_03, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.
    2. Jonas Tungodden & Alexander Willén, 2023. "When Parents Decide: Gender Differences in Competitiveness," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 131(3), pages 751-801.
    3. Thijs Brouwer & Fabio Galeotti & Marie Claire Villeval, 2023. "Teaching Norms: Direct Evidence of Parental Transmission," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 133(650), pages 872-887.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chowdhury, Shyamal & Sutter, Matthias & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2018. "Evaluating intergenerational persistence of economic preferences: A large scale experiment with families in Bangladesh," MERIT Working Papers 2018-008, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    2. Breitkopf, Laura & Chowdhury, Shyamal K. & Priyam, Shambhavi & Schildberg-Hörisch, Hannah & Sutter, Matthias, 2020. "Do economic preferences of children predict behavior?," DICE Discussion Papers 342, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    3. Laura Breitkopf & Shyamal Chowdhury & Shambhavi Priyam & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch & Matthias Sutter, 2024. "Do economic preferences of children predict behavior?," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2024_09, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.
    4. Horn, Dániel & Kiss, Hubert János & Lénárd, Tünde, 2022. "Gender differences in preferences of adolescents: Evidence from a large-scale classroom experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 478-522.
    5. Sutter, Matthias & Zoller, Claudia & Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela, 2019. "Economic behavior of children and adolescents – A first survey of experimental economics results," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 98-121.
    6. Brenøe, Anne Ardila & Epper, Thomas, 2022. "Parenting values and the intergenerational transmission of time preferences," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    7. John A. List & Ragan Petrie & Anya Samek, 2023. "How Experiments with Children Inform Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 61(2), pages 504-564, June.
    8. Detlefsen, Lena & Friedl, Andreas & Lima de Miranda, Katharina & Schmidt, Ulrich & Sutter, Matthias, 2018. "Are Economic Preferences Shaped by the Family Context? The Impact of Birth Order and Siblings' Sex Composition on Economic Preferences," IZA Discussion Papers 11949, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Schildberg-Hörisch, Hannah & Deckers, Thomas & Falk, Armin & Kosse, Fabian, 2014. "How Does Socio-Economic Status Shape a Child's Personality?," VfS Annual Conference 2014 (Hamburg): Evidence-based Economic Policy 100285, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    10. Tomáš Želinský, 2021. "Intertemporal Choices of Children and Adults from Poor Roma Communities: A Case Study from Slovakia," Eastern European Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(4), pages 378-405, July.
    11. Etienne Dagorn & David Masclet & Thierry Penard, 2022. "The Behavioral Determinants of School Achievement: A Lab in the Field Experiment in Middle School," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes 1 & University of Caen) 2022-05, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes 1, University of Caen and CNRS.
    12. James J. Heckman & Tomáš Jagelka & Timothy D. Kautz, 2019. "Some Contributions of Economics to the Study of Personality," NBER Working Papers 26459, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Armin Falk & Fabian Kosse & Pia Pinger & Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch & Thomas Deckers, 2021. "Socioeconomic Status and Inequalities in Children’s IQ and Economic Preferences," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 129(9), pages 2504-2545.
    14. Samek, Anya & Gray, Andre & Datar, Ashlesha & Nicosia, Nancy, 2021. "Adolescent time and risk preferences: Measurement, determinants and field consequences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 460-488.
    15. Sutter, Matthias & Angerer, Silvia & Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela & Lergetporer, Philipp, 2018. "Language group differences in time preferences: Evidence from primary school children in a bilingual city," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 21-34.
    16. Thijs Brouwer & Fabio Galeotti & Marie Claire Villeval, 2023. "Teaching Norms: Direct Evidence of Parental Transmission," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 133(650), pages 872-887.
    17. Silvia Angerer & E. Glenn Dutcher & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Philipp Lergetporer & Matthias Sutter, 2021. "The Formation of Risk Preferences through Small-Scale Events," CESifo Working Paper Series 9270, CESifo.
    18. Zubair, Maria & Khanum, Ayesha & Nasir, Marjan, 2018. "Transfer Of Behavioral Traits From Parents To Children: An Experimental Approach," MPRA Paper 92121, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Sutter, Matthias & Untertrifaller, Anna, 2020. "Children's heterogeneity in cooperation and parental background: An experimental study," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 286-296.
    20. Tim Friehe & Markus Pannenberg, 2020. "Time preferences and political regimes: evidence from reunified Germany," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 349-387, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bangladesh; socio-economic status; economic preferences within families; family clusters; intergenerational transmission of preferences; time preferences; risk preferences; social preferences; experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C90 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - General
    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • D90 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - General
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • D64 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J62 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Job, Occupational and Intergenerational Mobility; Promotion

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13451. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.