IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unm/umamet/2009039.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Individual risk attitudes: measurement, determinants and behavioral consequences

Author

Listed:
  • Dohmen, T.J.

    (Macro, International & Labour Economics, Research Centre for Educ and Labour Mark)

  • Falk, A.
  • Huffman, D.

    (Externe publicaties SBE)

  • Sunde, U.

    (Externe publicaties SBE)

  • Schupp, J.
  • Wagner, G.G.

Abstract

This paper studies risk attitudes using a large representative survey and a complementary experiment conducted with a representative subject pool in subjects’ homes. Using a question asking people about their willingness to take risks \"in general\", we find that gender, age, height, and parental background have an economically significant impact on willingness to take risks. The experiment confirms the behavioral validity of this measure, using paid lottery choices. Turning to other questions about risk attitudes in specific contexts, we find similar results on the determinants of risk attitudes, and also shed light on the deeper question of stability of risk attitudes across contexts. We conduct a horse race of the ability of different measures to explain risky behaviors such as holdings stocks, occupational choice, and smoking. The question about risk taking in general generates the best all-round predictor of risky behavior.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Dohmen, T.J. & Falk, A. & Huffman, D. & Sunde, U. & Schupp, J. & Wagner, G.G., 2009. "Individual risk attitudes: measurement, determinants and behavioral consequences," Research Memorandum 039, Maastricht University, Maastricht Research School of Economics of Technology and Organization (METEOR).
  • Handle: RePEc:unm:umamet:2009039
    DOI: 10.26481/umamet.2009039
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cris.maastrichtuniversity.nl/ws/files/572226/guid-3bd722e3-ab03-4159-a20b-f2913bea9070-ASSET1.0.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.26481/umamet.2009039?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D0 - Microeconomics - - General
    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments

    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:unm:umamet:2009039. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Andrea Willems or Leonne Portz (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/meteonl.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.