Can altruism lead to a willingness to take risks?

Oded Stark

The Journal of Mathematical Sociology, 2024, vol. 48, issue 2, 272-278

Abstract: I study attitudes towards risk taking in cases where a person relates to others positively, namely altruistically. This study is needed because it is unclear how altruism influences the inclination of an altruistic person to take risks. Will this person’s risk-taking behavior differ if the utility of another person does not enter his utility function? Does being altruistic cause a person to become more reluctant to take risks because a risky undertaking turning sour will also damage his ability to make altruistic transfers? Or does altruism induce a person to resort to risky behavior because the reward for a successful outcome is amplified by the outcome facilitating a bigger transfer to the beneficiary of the altruistic act? Specifically, holding constant other variables, I ask: is an altruistic person more risk averse or less risk averse than a comparable person who is not altruistic? In response to this question, using a simple model in which preferences are represented by a logarithmic utility function, I show that an altruistic person who is an active donor (benefactor) is less risk averse than a comparable person who is not altruistic: altruism is a cause of greater willingness to take risks. The finding that the altruism trait causes greater willingness to take risks has not previously been noted in the existing literature.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/0022250X.2023.2248645 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Can altruism lead to a willingness to take risks? (2023)
Working Paper: Can Altruism Lead to a Willingness to Take Risks? (2023)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:gmasxx:v:48:y:2024:i:2:p:272-278

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/gmas20

DOI: 10.1080/0022250X.2023.2248645

Access Statistics for this article

The Journal of Mathematical Sociology is currently edited by Noah Friedkin

More articles in The Journal of Mathematical Sociology from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().