Loss Attitudes in the U.S. Population: Evidence from Dynamically Optimized Sequential Experimentation (DOSE) / Jonathan Chapman, Erik Snowberg, Stephanie Wang, Colin Camerer.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Chapman, Jonathan.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Snowberg, Erik.

Wang, Stephanie.

Camerer, Colin.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w25072.

NBER working paper series no. w25072

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Loss Attitudes in the U.S. Population

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2018.

Summary:

We introduce DOSE - Dynamically Optimized Sequential Experimentation - and use it to estimate individual-level loss aversion in a representative sample of the U.S. population (N=2,000). DOSE elicitations are more accurate, more stable across time, and faster to administer than standard methods. We find that around 50% of the U.S. population is loss tolerant. This is counter to earlier findings, which mostly come from lab/student samples, that a strong majority of participants are loss averse. Loss attitudes are correlated with cognitive ability: loss aversion is more prevalent in people with high cognitive ability, and loss tolerance is more common in those with low cognitive ability. We also use DOSE to document facts about risk and time preferences, indicating a high potential for DOSE in future research.

Notes:

Print version record

September 2018.