IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jfamec/v42y2021i4d10.1007_s10834-021-09773-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Student Loan Decision Making: Experience as an Anchor

Author

Listed:
  • Nilton Porto

    (University of Rhode Island)

  • Soo Hyun Cho

    (California State University, Long Beach)

  • Michael Gutter

    (University of Florida)

Abstract

The purpose of study is to examine the association between one's past borrowing experience and borrowing decisions in a hypothetical survey scenario. A total of 1928 responses from an online survey panel were analyzed, with a built-in anchoring question. Using the concept of anchoring bias as a reference point, survey participants were shown a hypothetical scenario regarding college attendance and asked two relevant questions: is it wise to attend college and how much student loans one should take out to attend college. Results indicated that the more one borrowed personally, the more one is likely to think a higher amount being borrowed by a hypothetical high-school graduate is prudent. This connection between experience and present advice can be described as a novel anchoring effect.

Suggested Citation

  • Nilton Porto & Soo Hyun Cho & Michael Gutter, 2021. "Student Loan Decision Making: Experience as an Anchor," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 42(4), pages 773-784, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jfamec:v:42:y:2021:i:4:d:10.1007_s10834-021-09773-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s10834-021-09773-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10834-021-09773-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10834-021-09773-5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cen, Ling & Hilary, Gilles & Wei, K. C. John, 2013. "The Role of Anchoring Bias in the Equity Market: Evidence from Analysts’ Earnings Forecasts and Stock Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(1), pages 47-76, February.
    2. Jonathan E. Alevy & Craig E. Landry & John A. List, 2015. "Field Experiments On The Anchoring Of Economic Valuations," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(3), pages 1522-1538, July.
    3. Boris Nikolaev, 2018. "Does Higher Education Increase Hedonic and Eudaimonic Happiness?," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 483-504, February.
    4. Dan Ariely & George Loewenstein & Drazen Prelec, 2003. ""Coherent Arbitrariness": Stable Demand Curves Without Stable Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(1), pages 73-106.
    5. Gary S. Becker, 1962. "Investment in Human Capital: A Theoretical Analysis," NBER Chapters, in: Investment in Human Beings, pages 9-49, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Jeffrey R. Brown & Caroline M. Hoxby, 2014. "How the Financial Crisis and Great Recession Affected Higher Education," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number brow12-2.
    7. Harrison Hong & Ilan Kremer & Jeffrey D. Kubik & Jianping Mei & Michael Moses, 2015. "Ordering, revenue and anchoring in art auctions," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 46(1), pages 186-216, March.
    8. Churchill, Gilbert A, Jr & Moschis, George P, 1979. "Television and Interpersonal Influences on Adolescent Consumer Learning," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 6(1), pages 23-35, June.
    9. Casey Dougal & Joseph Engelberg & Christopher A. Parsons & Edward D. Van Wesep, 2015. "Anchoring on Credit Spreads," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(3), pages 1039-1080, June.
    10. Holst, G.S. & Hermann, D. & Mußhoff, O., 2015. "Anchoring Effects in an Experimental Auction," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 50, March.
    11. Oreopoulos, Philip, 2007. "Do dropouts drop out too soon? Wealth, health and happiness from compulsory schooling," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(11-12), pages 2213-2229, December.
    12. Abraham, Katharine G. & Filiz-Ozbay, Emel & Ozbay, Erkut Y. & Turner, Lesley J., 2020. "Framing effects, earnings expectations, and the design of student loan repayment schemes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 183(C).
    13. Phillips, Owen R. & Menkhaus, Dale J., 2010. "The culture of private negotiation: Endogenous price anchors in simple bilateral bargaining experiments," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 705-715, December.
    14. Holst, Gesa Sophie & Hermann, Daniel & Musshoff, Oliver, 2015. "Anchoring effects in an experimental auction – Are farmers anchored?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 106-117.
    15. Cliff A. Robb & Swarn Chatterjee & Nilton Porto & Brenda J. Cude, 2019. "The Influence of Student Loan Debt on Financial Satisfaction," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 51-73, March.
    16. Christopher Avery & Sarah Turner, 2012. "Student Loans: Do College Students Borrow Too Much--Or Not Enough?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 26(1), pages 165-192, Winter.
    17. Louis Tay & Cassondra Batz & Scott Parrigon & Lauren Kuykendall, 2017. "Debt and Subjective Well-being: The Other Side of the Income-Happiness Coin," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 903-937, June.
    18. Christopher Tamborini & ChangHwan Kim & Arthur Sakamoto, 2015. "Education and Lifetime Earnings in the United States," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 52(4), pages 1383-1407, August.
    19. Bridget Terry Long, 2014. "The Financial Crisis and College Enrollment: How Have Students and Their Families Responded?," NBER Chapters, in: How the Financial Crisis and Great Recession Affected Higher Education, pages 209-233, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Sugden, Robert & Zheng, Jiwei & Zizzo, Daniel John, 2013. "Not all anchors are created equal," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 21-31.
    21. Brent J. Evans & Angela Boatman, 2019. "Understanding How Information Affects Loan Aversion: A Randomized Control Trial of Providing Federal Loan Information to High School Seniors," The Journal of Higher Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 90(5), pages 800-832, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Manuel Salas-Velasco, 2024. "Debiasing the availability heuristic in student loan decision-making," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 51(2), pages 501-528, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till, 2014. "Are groups 'less behavioral'? The case of anchoring," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 188, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    2. Yigit Oezcelik & Michel Tolksdorf, 2023. "Non-numerical and social anchoring in consumer-generated ratings," Working Papers 202319, University of Liverpool, Department of Economics.
    3. Chui, Peter M.W. & Fong, Lawrence Hoc Nang & Ren, Jinjuan & Tam, Lewis H.K., 2022. "Anchoring effects in repeated auctions of homogeneous objects: Evidence from Macao," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    4. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till E., 2015. "Anchoring in social context," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 29-39.
    5. Li, Lunzheng & Maniadis, Zacharias & Sedikides, Constantine, 2021. "Anchoring in Economics: A Meta-Analysis of Studies on Willingness-To-Pay and Willingness-To-Accept," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    6. Lukas Meub & Till Proeger, 2018. "Are groups ‘less behavioral’? The case of anchoring," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 85(2), pages 117-150, August.
    7. Konstantinos Ioannidis & Theo Offerman & Randolph Sloof, 2020. "On the effect of anchoring on valuations when the anchor is transparently uninformative," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 6(1), pages 77-94, June.
    8. Tanya O’Garra & Matthew R Sisco, 2020. "The effect of anchors and social information on behaviour," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(4), pages 1-19, April.
    9. Wallander, Steven & Paul, Laura A. & Ferraro, Paul J. & Messer, Kent D. & Iovanna, Richard, 2023. "Informational nudges in conservation auctions: A field experiment with U.S. farmers," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    10. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till, 2014. "An experimental study on social anchoring," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 196, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    11. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till, 2016. "Are groups 'less behavioral'? The case of anchoring," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 188 [rev.], University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    12. Magdalena Brzozowicz & Michał Krawczyk, 2020. "Honey, Mugs and Caricatures: anchors on prices of consumer goods only hold hypothetically," Working Papers 2020-40, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw.
    13. Bahník, Štěpán & Yoon, Sangsuk, 2023. "Anchoring effect in business," OSF Preprints 98qdv, Center for Open Science.
    14. Glenk, Klaus & Meyerhoff, Jürgen & Akaichi, Faical & Martin-Ortega, Julia, 2019. "Revisiting cost vector effects in discrete choice experiments," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 135-155.
    15. Ivanova-Stenzel, Radosveta & Seres, Gyula, 2021. "Are strategies anchored?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    16. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine & Zacharias Maniadis, 2012. "On the Robustness of Anchoring Effects in WTP and WTA Experiments," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 131-145, May.
    17. Sugden, Robert & Zheng, Jiwei & Zizzo, Daniel John, 2013. "Not all anchors are created equal," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 21-31.
    18. Choi, James J. & Haisley, Emily & Kurkoski, Jennifer & Massey, Cade, 2017. "Small cues change savings choices," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 378-395.
    19. Kathryn Graddy & Lara Loewenstein & Jianping Mei & Mike Moses & Rachel A. J. Pownall, 2023. "Empirical evidence of anchoring and loss aversion from art auctions," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 47(2), pages 279-301, June.
    20. Jetter, Michael & Walker, Jay K., 2017. "Anchoring in financial decision-making: Evidence from Jeopardy!," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 164-176.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:jfamec:v:42:y:2021:i:4:d:10.1007_s10834-021-09773-5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.