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Are Risk Preferences Stable? Comparing an Experimental Measure with a Validated Survey-Based Measure
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Are Risk Preferences Stable? Comparing an Experimental Measure with a Validated Survey-Based Measure

Author

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  • Lisa R. Anderson

    (Department of Economics, College of William and Mary)

  • Jennifer M. Mellor

    (Department of Economics, College of William and Mary)

Abstract

We examine the stability of risk preference within subjects by comparing measures obtained from two elicitation methods, an economics experiment with real monetary rewards and a survey with questions on hypothetical gambles. The survey questions have been validated by numerous empirical studies of investment, insurance demand, smoking and alcohol use, and recent studies have shown the experimental measure is associated with several real-world risky behaviors. For the majority of subjects, we find that risk preferences are not stable across elicitation methods. In interval regression models, subjects’ risk preference classifications from survey questions on job-based gambles are not associated with risk preference estimates from the experiment. However, we find that risk classifications from inheritance-based gambles are significantly associated with the experimental measure. We identify some subjects for whom risk preference estimates are more strongly correlated across elicitation methods, suggesting that unobserved subject traits like comprehension or effort influence risk preference stability.

Suggested Citation

  • Lisa R. Anderson & Jennifer M. Mellor, 2008. "Are Risk Preferences Stable? Comparing an Experimental Measure with a Validated Survey-Based Measure," Working Papers 74, Department of Economics, College of William and Mary.
    • Handle: RePEc:cwm:wpaper:74
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Risk Preferences; Laboratory Experiment; Survey;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments
    • D8 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty

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