Aging and decision making: A comparison between neurologically healthy elderly and young individuals

Stephanie Kovalchik, Colin F. Camerer, David Grether, Charles Plott () and John M. Allman

No 1180, Working Papers from California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences

Abstract: We report the results of experiments on economic decisions with two populations, one of healthy elderly individuals (average age 82) and one of younger students (average age 20). We examine confidence, decisions under uncertainty, differences between willingness to pay and willingness to accept and the theory of mind (strategic thinking). Our findings indicate that the older adults' decision behavior is similar to that of young adults, contrary to the notion that economic decision making is impaired with age. Choices over lotteries do not reflect the age differences previously reported in the psychology and biology literature. Moreover, some of the demonstrated decision behaviors suggest that the elderly individuals are less biased than the younger individuals.(1)There is a greater prevalence of overconfident behavior in the younger population. (2) Our results show no significant support for a theory of an endowment effect in either population. (3) Both populations perform similarly on the beauty contest task, although there is a modest indication of a higher incidence of confused behavior by the older

Keywords: Age; overconfidence; willingness to pay/accept; endowment effect; theory of mind; game theory; risk-taking (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27 pages
Date: 2003-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-exp and nep-hea
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.hss.caltech.edu/SSPapers/wp1180rr.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found (http://www.hss.caltech.edu/SSPapers/wp1180rr.pdf [301 Moved Permanently]--> https://www.hss.caltech.edu/SSPapers/wp1180rr.pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Aging and decision making: a comparison between neurologically healthy elderly and young individuals (2005)
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:clt:sswopa:1180

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
Working Paper Assistant, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 228-77, Caltech, Pasadena CA 91125

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences Working Paper Assistant, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences, 228-77, Caltech, Pasadena CA 91125.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Victoria Mason ().