Gender Differences in Risk Aversion and Ambiguity Aversion

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn is a local and virtual international research center and a place of communication between science, politics and business. IZA is an independent nonprofit organization supported by Deutsche Post Foundation. The center is associated with the University of Bonn and offers a stimulating research environment through its international network, workshops and conferences, data service, project support, research visits and doctoral program. IZA engages in (i) original and internationally competitive research in all fields of labor economics, (ii) development of policy concepts, and (iii) dissemination of research results and concepts to the interested public. Terms of use: Documents in D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SIZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author. This paper demonstrates gender differences in risk aversion and ambiguity aversion. It also contributes to a growing literature relating economic preference parameters to psychological measures by asking whether variations in preference parameters among persons, and in particular across genders, can be accounted for by differences in personality traits and traits of cognition. Women are more risk averse than men. Over an initial range, women require no further compensation for the introduction of ambiguity but men do. At greater levels of ambiguity, women have the same marginal distaste for increased ambiguity as men. Psychological variables account for some of the interpersonal variation in risk aversion. They explain none of the differences in ambiguity.JEL Classification: J24, D03, D80

Estimating ambiguity preferences and perceptions in multiple prior models: Evidence from the field

“…Turning first to ambiguity aversion (α), we find that men are more ambiguity averse than women, consistent with the experimental results in Borghans et al (2009). Ambiguity aversion is positively related to risk aversion, but the correlation is low and ambiguity aversion is not subsumed by it.…”

“… 29 Borghans et al (2009) find that men are more ambiguity averse than women in a sample of 347 high school students. In a study of the Dutch population, Dimmock et al (2015b) estimate the relation between ambiguity attitudes and control variables; there, however, few effects are statistically significant (sample size: N =666).…”

Can personality type explain heterogeneity in probability distortions?

“…Secondly, personality reflects generally stable patterns in behavior, motivation, and cognition (Borghans et al, 2009; Zillig, Hemenover & Dienstbier, 2002). Borghans, Golsteyn, Heckman and Meijers (2009) conducted an experiment on a sample of 347 Dutch high school students; they showed that the differences in cognitive and non-cognitive personality traits, such as IQ, the Big Five (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism), and self-control accounted for the differences in preference parameters. Zuckerman (2007) also found that differences in sensation-seeking personality traits (i.e.…”

Angels and Demons: Using Behavioral Types in a Real-Effort Moral Dilemma to Identify Expert Traits

“…Researchers have also linked experimental behavior to the results of testing such for IQ (Oechssler et al, 2009; Brañas-Garza et al, 2012, 2015), social intelligence (Takagishi et al, 2010), and personality (Almlund et al, 2011; Rustichini et al, 2012). However, the findings are not consistent with one another (Ben-Ner et al, 2007; Eckel and Grossman, 2008; Borghans et al, 2009; Hirsh and Peterson, 2009; Oechssler et al, 2009; DeAngelo et al, 2015). …”