We investigate the role of financial advice in shaping the composition of household portfolios in Great Britain. Advice is associated with a reallocation of wealth away from real estate and towards bonds and stocks, especially when households seek financial advice "for investments". Having a...

We investigate the relationship between subjective probabilities of future stock market returns and decisions about stockholding. Specifically, we examine whether acting upon subjective probabilities is confined to individuals with high cognitive skills. We explore this question using data from...

This paper analyzes 12,596 wagering decisions of 6,064 contestants in the US game show Jeopardy!, focusing on the anchoring phenomenon in financial decision-making. We find that contestants anchor heavily on the initial dollar value of a clue in their wagering decision, even though there exists...

We explore the relationship between household finances and personality traits from an empirical perspective. Specifically, using individual level data drawn from the British Household Panel Survey, we analyse the influence of personality traits on financial decision-making at the individual...

While commitment devices such as defaults and direct deposits from wages have been found to be highly effective to increase savings, they are unavailable to the millions of people worldwide who not have a formal wage bill. Self-help peer groups are an alternative commitment device that is...

The existing literature suggests that when the saving decision of two-earner households under risk is analysed, standard results on the existence of precautionary saving no longer apply: precautionary saving is obtained if and only if very stringent conditions hold. This paper shows that when...

We explore the relationship between gambling and other forms of risk-taking behaviour, i.e. exposure to debt and the use of credit, at the individual and household level using representative pooled cross-section data drawn from the UK Expenditure and Food Surveys (EFS), 2001 to 2007. Gambling...

This paper analyzes the stability and distribution of ambiguity attitudes using a broad population sample. Using high-powered incentives, we collected six waves of data on ambiguity attitudes about financial markets – our main application – and climate change. Estimating a structural...

We report an experiment that infers true overconfidence in relative ability through actions, as opposed to reported beliefs. Subjects choose how to invest earnings from a skill task when the returns depend solely upon risk, or both risk and relative placement, enabling joint estimation of...

This paper provides evidence on the impacts of non-cognitive skills and attitudes towards risk on the decision to migrate from rural to urban areas. Our analysis is based on a unique four-wave panel of Ukrainian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey for the period between 2003 and 2012. Adopting the...