IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp6557.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why Do People Pay for Useless Advice? Implications of Gambler's and Hot-Hand Fallacies in False-Expert Setting

Author

Listed:
  • Powdthavee, Nattavudh

    (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore)

  • Riyanto, Yohanes E.

    (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore)

Abstract

We investigated experimentally whether people can be induced to believe in a non-existent expert, and subsequently pay for what can only be described as transparently useless advice about future chance events. Consistent with the theoretical predictions made by Rabin (2002) and Rabin and Vayanos (2010), we show empirically that the answer is yes and that the size of the error made systematically by people is large.

Suggested Citation

  • Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Riyanto, Yohanes E., 2012. "Why Do People Pay for Useless Advice? Implications of Gambler's and Hot-Hand Fallacies in False-Expert Setting," IZA Discussion Papers 6557, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp6557
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp6557.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rachel Croson & James Sundali, 2005. "The Gambler’s Fallacy and the Hot Hand: Empirical Data from Casinos," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 30(3), pages 195-209, May.
    2. Sigrid Suetens & Claus B. Galbo-Jørgensen & Jean-Robert Tyran, 2016. "Predicting Lotto Numbers: A Natural Experiment on the Gambler's Fallacy and the Hot-Hand Fallacy," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 584-607.
    3. Matthew Rabin, 2002. "Inference by Believers in the Law of Small Numbers," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(3), pages 775-816.
    4. Fama, Eugene F, 1991. "Efficient Capital Markets: II," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(5), pages 1575-1617, December.
    5. Jonathan Guryan & Melissa S. Kearney, 2008. "Gambling at Lucky Stores: Empirical Evidence from State Lottery Sales," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(1), pages 458-473, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. La Fuerte Demanda por Charlatanes
      by Alejandro Villagomez in Tintero Económico Diario on 2012-05-28 05:14:00

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Victor Haghani & Richard Dewey, 2017. "Rational Decision-Making Under Uncertainty: Observed Betting Patterns on a Biased Coin," Papers 1701.01427, arXiv.org.
    2. Leuermann, Andrea & Roth, Benjamin, 2012. "Does good advice come cheap? - On the assessment of risk preferences in the lab and the field," Working Papers 0534, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    3. Ibrahim Filiz & Thomas Nahmer & Markus Spiwoks & Kilian Bizer, 2018. "Portfolio diversification: the influence of herding, status-quo bias, and the gambler’s fallacy," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 32(2), pages 167-205, May.
    4. Andrea Leuermann & Benjamin Roth, 2012. "Does Good Advice Come Cheap?: On the Assessment of Risk Preferences in the Lab and in the Field," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 475, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).

    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. Nattavudh Powdthavee & Yohanes E. Riyanto, 2012. "Why Do People Pay for Useless Advice?," CEP Discussion Papers dp1153, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    2. Daniel J. Benjamin, 2018. "Errors in Probabilistic Reasoning and Judgment Biases," NBER Working Papers 25200, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Qingxia Kong & Georg D. Granic & Nicolas S. Lambert & Chung Piaw Teo, 2020. "Judgment Error in Lottery Play: When the Hot Hand Meets the Gambler’s Fallacy," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(2), pages 844-862, February.
    4. Joshua B. Miller & Adam Sanjurjo, 2018. "Surprised by the Hot Hand Fallacy? A Truth in the Law of Small Numbers," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(6), pages 2019-2047, November.
    5. Joshua B. Miller & Adam Sanjurjo, 2019. "Surprised by the Hot Hand Fallacy? A Truth in the Law of Small Numbers," Papers 1902.01265, arXiv.org.
    6. Joshua B. Miller & Adam Sanjurjo, 2014. "A Cold Shower for the Hot Hand Fallacy," Working Papers 518, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    7. He, Kevin, 2022. "Mislearning from censored data: The gambler's fallacy and other correlational mistakes in optimal-stopping problems," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 17(3), July.
    8. Daniel L. Chen & Tobias J. Moskowitz & Kelly Shue, 2016. "Decision Making Under the Gambler’s Fallacy: Evidence from Asylum Judges, Loan Officers, and Baseball Umpires," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(3), pages 1181-1242.
    9. Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler & Thomas Stöckl, 2010. "The hot hand belief and the gambler’s fallacy in investment decisions under risk," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 68(4), pages 445-462, April.
    10. Neszveda, G., 2019. "Essays on behavioral finance," Other publications TiSEM 05059039-5236-42a3-be1b-3, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    11. Joshua B. Miller & Adam Sanjurjo, 2015. "Surprised by the Gambler’s and Hot Hand Fallacies? A Truth in the Law of Small Numbers," Working Papers 552, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    12. Daniel J. Benjamin & Don A. Moore & Matthew Rabin, 2017. "Biased Beliefs About Random Samples: Evidence from Two Integrated Experiments," NBER Working Papers 23927, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Joshua B. Miller & Adam Sanjurjo, 2015. "Is it a Fallacy to Believe in the Hot Hand in the NBA Three-Point Contest?," Working Papers 548, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    14. Daniel Chen & Tobias J. Moskowitz & Kelly Shue, 2016. "Decision-Making under the Gambler's Fallacy: Evidence from Asylum Judges, Loan Officers, and Baseball Umpires," NBER Working Papers 22026, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Doidge, Mary & Feng, Hongli & Hennessy, David A., 2017. "A test of the gambler’s and hot hand fallacies in farmers’ weather and market predictions," 2017 Annual Meeting, July 30-August 1, Chicago, Illinois 258457, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    16. Brian Dillon & Travis J. Lybbert, 2024. "The gambler’s fallacy prevails in lottery play," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 69(1), pages 33-56, August.
    17. Miller, Joshua B. & Sanjurjo, Adam, 2021. "Is it a fallacy to believe in the hot hand in the NBA three-point contest?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    18. Miller, Joshua Benjamin & Sanjurjo, Adam, 2018. "A Visible (Hot) Hand? Expert Players Bet on the Hot Hand and Win," OSF Preprints sd32u, Center for Open Science.
    19. Miller, Joshua Benjamin & Sanjurjo, Adam, 2018. "Is it a Fallacy to Believe in the Hot Hand in the NBA Three-Point Contest?," OSF Preprints dmksp, Center for Open Science.
    20. Miller, Joshua Benjamin & Sanjurjo, Adam, 2018. "A Bridge from Monty Hall to the Hot Hand: Restricted Choice, Selection Bias, and Empirical Practice," OSF Preprints dmgtp, Center for Open Science.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    information; expertise; gambler's fallacy; hot-hand; random streak;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles

    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:dp6557. 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.