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Do MTurkers exhibit myopic loss aversion?

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  • Schwaiger, Rene
  • Hueber, Laura

Abstract

We present results from a highly powered online experiment with 937 participants on Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) that examined whether MTurkers exhibit myopic loss aversion (MLA). The experiment consisted of measuring MLA-compliant behavior in two between-subjects treatments that differed only regarding the risk profile of the risky asset employed. We found no statistically significant evidence of MLA-compliant behavior for any of the two risk profiles among MTurkers in the full samples. However, we found evidence of MLA for one of the two risk profiles in some sub-samples where we screened-out participants based on processing times in the experiment.

Suggested Citation

  • Schwaiger, Rene & Hueber, Laura, 2021. "Do MTurkers exhibit myopic loss aversion?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:209:y:2021:i:c:s0165176521004146
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2021.110137
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Online experiment; Myopic loss aversion; Risk; Mturk;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G41 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making in Financial Markets

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