IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jrisks/v9y2021i8p140-d601945.html

Eliciting Risk Preferences Experimentally versus Using a General Risk Question. Does Financial Literacy Bridge the Gap?

Author

Listed:
  • Calvin Mudzingiri

    (Department of Economics and Finance, University of the Free State, Phuthaditjhaba 9866, South Africa)

  • Ur Koumba

    (Department of Mathematics, University of the Free State, Phuthaditjhaba 9866, South Africa)

Abstract

The study investigates the stability of financial risk preference choices elicited from subjects by way of two methods, namely: experimentally elicited incentivized revealed risk preferences (IRRP) and (self-reported) perceived willingness to take a financial risk (PWTFR). The research further examines whether financial literacy (a human capital aspect) helps in reducing the gap between IRRP and PWTFR choices made by subjects. A total of 193 university students (where 53% were female) participated in the study. The subjects completed IRRP choices from four multiple price list (MPL) risk preference tasks and a financial literacy questionnaire. There is a tendency to anchor at extremes of risk-seeking behavior when subjects self-report their PWTFR choices. A paired t -test analysis of the two methods shows that the average responses from the two methods are significantly different. A random effect (RE) panel regression shows that an increase in financial literacy narrows the gap between IRRP and PWTFR choices. The study’s findings show that responses by subjects from a PWTFR general risk question (GRQ) and IRRP experiment are unstable and inconsistent. What people say in a survey does not always translate into what they do when faced with a risk preference choice dilemma. Financial literacy helps individuals to predict their risk attitudes more precisely.

Suggested Citation

  • Calvin Mudzingiri & Ur Koumba, 2021. "Eliciting Risk Preferences Experimentally versus Using a General Risk Question. Does Financial Literacy Bridge the Gap?," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(8), pages 1-16, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jrisks:v:9:y:2021:i:8:p:140-:d:601945
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9091/9/8/140/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9091/9/8/140/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Calvin Mudzingiri & Sevias Guvuriro & Charity Gomo, 2021. "Exploring Association between Self-Reported Financial Status and Economic Preferences Using Experimental Data," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-13, May.
    2. Justine S. Hastings & Brigitte C. Madrian & William L. Skimmyhorn, 2013. "Financial Literacy, Financial Education, and Economic Outcomes," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 5(1), pages 347-373, May.
    3. Andreas Pedroni & Renato Frey & Adrian Bruhin & Gilles Dutilh & Ralph Hertwig & Jörg Rieskamp, 2017. "The risk elicitation puzzle," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 1(11), pages 803-809, November.
    4. Pan He & Marcella Veronesi & Stefanie Engel, 2016. "Consistency of Risk Preference Measures and the Role of Ambiguity: An Artefactual Field Experiment from China," Working Papers 03/2016, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    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. Calvin Mudzingiri, 2024. "The Effect of Financial Literacy Confidence on Financial Risk Preference Confidence. A Lab Experiment Approach," SAGE Open, , vol. 14(2), pages 21582440241, May.

    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. Yin, Libo & Xin, Yu, 2024. "China's cognitive bias premium: An exploration of innovation information," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 96(PA).
    2. Margaret Miller & Julia Reichelstein & Christian Salas & Bilal Zia, 2015. "Can You Help Someone Become Financially Capable? A Meta-Analysis of the Literature," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 30(2), pages 220-246.
    3. Angelici, Marta & Del Boca, Daniela & Oggero, Noemi & Profeta, Paola & Rossi, Maria Cristina & Villosio, Claudia, 2022. "Pension information and women’s awareness," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 23(C).
    4. Gerrans, Paul & Yap, Ghialy, 2014. "Retirement savings investment choices: Sophisticated or naive?," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 233-250.
    5. Dalton, Patricio S. & Nhung, Nguyen & Rüschenpöhler, Julius, 2020. "Worries of the poor: The impact of financial burden on the risk attitudes of micro-entrepreneurs," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    6. Marieke Bos & Chloé Le Coq & Peter van Santen, 2022. "Scarcity and consumers’ credit choices," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 92(1), pages 105-139, February.
    7. Sandra E Black & Paul J Devereux & Petter Lundborg & Kaveh Majlesi, 2018. "Learning to Take Risks? The Effect of Education on Risk-Taking in Financial Markets," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 22(3), pages 951-975.
    8. Sandro Ambuehl & B. Douglas Bernheim & Annamaria Lusardi, 2022. "Evaluating Deliberative Competence: A Simple Method with an Application to Financial Choice," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(11), pages 3584-3626, November.
    9. Wang, Luanfeng & Dang, Chongqing, 2025. "Financial literacy and residents' health levels," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    10. Mequanint B. Melesse & Amos Nyangira Tirra & Yabibal M. Walle & Michael Hauser, 2023. "Understanding the Determinants of Aspirations in Rural Tanzania: Does Financial Literacy Matter?," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 35(6), pages 1294-1321, December.
    11. Yaakov Itach, 2019. "Financial Literacy Level Of High School Students And Its Economic Patterns Reflections," Almanac of PhD Students, D. A. Tsenov Academy of Economics, Svishtov, Bulgaria, vol. 15(15 Year 2), pages 518-537.
    12. Nienke F. S. Dijkstra & Henning Tiemeier & Bernd Figner & Patrick J. F. Groenen, 2022. "A Censored Mixture Model for Modeling Risk Taking," Psychometrika, Springer;The Psychometric Society, vol. 87(3), pages 1103-1129, September.
    13. Nourallah, Mustafa & Öhman, Peter & Hamati, Samer, 2024. "Financial technology and financial capability: Study of the European Union," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    14. Sumaira Khawar & Aamir Sarwar, 2021. "Financial literacy and financial behavior with the mediating effect of family financial socialization in the financial institutions of Lahore, Pakistan," Future Business Journal, Springer, vol. 7(1), pages 1-11, December.
    15. Zeeshan Ahmed & Shahid Rasool & Qasim Saleem & Mubashir Ali Khan & Shamsa Kanwal, 2022. "Mediating Role of Risk Perception Between Behavioral Biases and Investor’s Investment Decisions," SAGE Open, , vol. 12(2), pages 21582440221, May.
    16. Joseph Teal & Petko Kusev & Renata Heilman & Rose Martin & Alessia Passanisi & Ugo Pace, 2021. "Problem Gambling ‘Fuelled on the Fly’," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(16), pages 1-14, August.
    17. repec:osf:osfxxx:b7zd6_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. William L. Skimmyhorn, 2016. "Comparing Military and Civilian Household Finances: Descriptive Evidence from Recent Surveys," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(2), pages 471-483, July.
    19. Zhang, Hua & Kuhn, Lena & Xiong, Hang & Sun, Zhanli, 2026. "Farmers' preferences for agricultural drone services under uncertainty: A choice experiment in Hubei, China," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 25(6), pages 2188-2200.
    20. Marcin Kawiński & Piotr Majewski, 2017. "Financial and insurance literacy in Poland," Working Papers 2017-03, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw.
    21. Gian Paolo Stella & Umberto Filotto & Enrico Maria Cervellati & Elvira Anna Graziano, 2020. "The Effects of Financial Education on Financial Literacy in Italy," International Business Research, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 13(4), pages 1-44, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:gam:jrisks:v:9:y:2021:i:8:p:140-:d:601945. 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: MDPI Indexing Manager The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask MDPI Indexing Manager to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.