In a seminal contribution, Thaler and Johnson ( 35 ) detected the existence of a house money effect which is defined as an increase in risk tolerance after previous gains resulting from a risky activity. Subsequent studies used the term house money effect also in case of windfall gains, i.e.,...

Buying a good on a loan entails numerous consumption and payment episodes. Loan users can either mentally integrate or separate these episodes. In order to identify the actual mental structures, we conducted 29 semi-structured interviews with current and prospective loan users. A content...