A Reconsideration of Gender Differences in Risk Attitudes
Grenoble Applied Economics Laboratory Working Papers 2014-01
31 Pages Posted: 27 Feb 2014
There are 2 versions of this paper
A Reconsideration of Gender Differences in Risk Attitudes
A Reconsideration of Gender Differences in Risk Attitudes
Date Written: January 30, 2014
Abstract
This paper reconsiders the wide agreement that females are more risk averse than males providing a leap forward in its understanding. Thoroughly surveying the literature we first find that gender differences are less ubiquitous than usually depicted. Gathering the microdata of an even larger sample of Holt and Laury replications we boost the statistical power of the test and we show that the magnitude of gender differences, although significant, is economically unimportant. We conclude that gender differences systematically correlate with the features of the elicitation method used and in particular the availability of a safe option and fixed probabilities.
Keywords: Gender, Risk, Survey
JEL Classification: C81, C91, D81
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation