Gender Differences in Risk Aversion and Ambiguity

Lex Borghans, Bart Golsteyn (), James Heckman and Huub Meijers

No 200903, Working Papers from Geary Institute, University College Dublin

Abstract: 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.

Pages: 18 pages
Date: 2009-03-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp and nep-upt
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucd:wpaper:200903

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