Personality influences hyperbolic discounting

Sergio Da Silva, Dinorá De Faveri and Raul Matsushita

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: We gather survey evidence for the influence of the HEXACO personality traits on the phenomenon of hyperbolic discounting. We also consider the demographics of age, sex, income and education, and evaluate how these interact with personality and hyperbolic discounting. Due to a sampling technique of “snowball,” we assembled a sample of well-educated and relatively wealthy adults from both sexes. Most respondents escaped hyperbolic discounting, and for those affected there was no “magnitude effect.” Those participants showing higher conscientiousness were less hyperbolic. Moreover, those more open to experience who were more extroverted at the same time were also less hyperbolic. We also detail how such personality traits influence hyperbolic discounting mediated by the demographics of age, sex, income and educational attainment. Thus, conscientiousness, openness to experience and extraversion are traits that contribute to rational decisions in intertemporal choice in our sample, in that participants with these personality traits are less hyperbolic.

Keywords: intertemporal choice; hyperbolic discounting; impatience; personality; HEXACO; Big Five (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D90 E03 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-edu and nep-exp
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Published in Open Access Library Journal 4.12(2017): pp. 1-12

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:83171

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