Who considers, who owns? Multi-study evidence on the behavioral process of cryptocurrency adoption in the United States

Cryptocurrency is a rapidly expanding landscape of digital assets spanning sociopolitical, psychological, technological, and financial domains. Although prior research identifies factors associated with owning cryptocurrency, most work overlooks the prerequisite considering stage. We draw on the Theory of Planned Behavior to examine whether individuals who would consider owning cryptocurrency differ from owners and those who reject the possibility of owning outright. Using three independent, nationally representative samples of US adults (n=803; n=1908; n=2086) and a modeling approach that allows us to compare the three groups, we find that roughly one in five respondents do not own, but would consider owning, cryptocurrency. While both considerers and owners share similar demographics and personality traits, considerers are not like owners in all ways or to the same degree: Conservative political ideology and technological optimism (support for developing artificial intelligence) relate more strongly to considering than owning, whereas stock ownership and disruptive orientations (the “Need for Chaos†) relate more strongly to owning than considering. Our data also mirror aggregate market patterns, with most respondents considering and owning Bitcoin (followed by Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies, e.g., Dogecoin and XRP). However, we further demonstrate that many individuals would consider or own more than one type. Taken together, the implication is that focusing only on ownership or certain types of cryptocurrency may obscure meaningful differences in evaluation and behavior. Accounting for these differences is therefore essential for understanding what cryptocurrency represents to various individuals, as well as effective communication, segmentation, and policy design.