IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/rqfnac/v53y2019i3d10.1007_s11156-018-0766-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Afraid of the stock market

Author

Listed:
  • Yuree Lim

    (University of Wisconsin-La Crosse)

  • Kyoung Tae Kim

    (University of Alabama)

Abstract

This study demonstrates the way investors psychological traits influence their financial behaviors in the stock market. Results from the Health and Retirement Study show that anxious individuals are reluctant to participate in the stock market and have a lower level of risky investments. Anxiety’s effect is more pronounced for less educated investors, implying that anxiety about the unknown stock market drives this effect. Analysis of individual traumatic experiences as instruments for the current anxiety level suggests a causal effect of anxiety on investment decisions.

Suggested Citation

  • Yuree Lim & Kyoung Tae Kim, 2019. "Afraid of the stock market," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 53(3), pages 773-810, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:53:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s11156-018-0766-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11156-018-0766-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11156-018-0766-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11156-018-0766-x?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. Alessandro Bucciol & Luca Zarri, 2013. "Financial Risk Aversion and Personal Life History," Working Papers 05/2013, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    2. Lisa A. Kramer & Mark J. Kamstra & Maurice D. Levi, 2000. "Losing Sleep at the Market: The Daylight Saving Anomaly," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 1005-1011, September.
    3. Luigi Guiso & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2008. "Trusting the Stock Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2557-2600, December.
    4. Mariassunta Giannetti & Tracy Yue Wang, 2016. "Corporate Scandals and Household Stock Market Participation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(6), pages 2591-2636, December.
    5. David Hirshleifer & Tyler Shumway, 2003. "Good Day Sunshine: Stock Returns and the Weather," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(3), pages 1009-1032, June.
    6. van Rooij, Maarten & Lusardi, Annamaria & Alessie, Rob, 2011. "Financial literacy and stock market participation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 449-472, August.
    7. Kimball, Miles S & Sahm, Claudia R & Shapiro, Matthew D, 2008. "Imputing Risk Tolerance From Survey Responses," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 103(483), pages 1028-1038.
    8. Luc Renneboog & Christophe Spaenjers, 2012. "Religion, economic attitudes, and household finance," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 64(1), pages 103-127, January.
    9. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2014. "The Economic Importance of Financial Literacy: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(1), pages 5-44, March.
    10. Lusardi, Annamaria & Mitchell, Olivia S., 2007. "Baby Boomer retirement security: The roles of planning, financial literacy, and housing wealth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 205-224, January.
    11. Saunders, Edward M, Jr, 1993. "Stock Prices and Wall Street Weather," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1337-1345, December.
    12. Andrew Caplin & John Leahy, 2001. "Psychological Expected Utility Theory and Anticipatory Feelings," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(1), pages 55-79.
    13. Grinblatt, Mark & Keloharju, Matti & Linnainmaa, Juhani T., 2012. "IQ, trading behavior, and performance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(2), pages 339-362.
    14. Sumit Agarwal & Bhashkar Mazumder, 2013. "Cognitive Abilities and Household Financial Decision Making," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 193-207, January.
    15. H. Henry Cao & Bing Han & David Hirshleifer & Harold H. Zhang, 2011. "Fear of the Unknown: Familiarity and Economic Decisions," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 15(1), pages 173-206.
    16. Conlin, Andrew & Kyröläinen, Petri & Kaakinen, Marika & Järvelin, Marjo-Riitta & Perttunen, Jukka & Svento, Rauli, 2015. "Personality traits and stock market participation," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 34-50.
    17. Christelis, Dimitris & Jappelli, Tullio & Padula, Mario, 2010. "Cognitive abilities and portfolio choice," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 18-38, January.
    18. Rosen, H.S.Harvey S. & Wu, Stephen, 2004. "Portfolio choice and health status," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(3), pages 457-484, June.
    19. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:1:p:137-163 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Mark J. Kamstra & Lisa A. Kramer & Maurice D. Levi, 2003. "Winter Blues: A SAD Stock Market Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 324-343, March.
    21. George M Korniotis & Alok Kumar, 2011. "Do Older Investors Make Better Investment Decisions?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(1), pages 244-265, February.
    22. Bogan, Vicki, 2008. "Stock Market Participation and the Internet," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(1), pages 191-211, March.
    23. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    24. Ulrike Malmendier & Stefan Nagel, 2011. "Depression Babies: Do Macroeconomic Experiences Affect Risk Taking?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(1), pages 373-416.
    25. Bonaparte, Yosef & Korniotis, George M. & Kumar, Alok, 2014. "Income hedging and portfolio decisions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(2), pages 300-324.
    26. David Hirshleifer, 2001. "Investor Psychology and Asset Pricing," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(4), pages 1533-1597, August.
    27. Jie-Haun Lee & Whei-May Fan, 2014. "Investors’ perception of corporate governance: a spillover effect of Taiwan corporate scandals," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 43(1), pages 97-119, July.
    28. Alex Edmans & Diego García & Øyvind Norli, 2007. "Sports Sentiment and Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1967-1998, August.
    29. Samuli Knüpfer & Elias Rantapuska & Matti Sarvimäki, 2017. "Formative Experiences and Portfolio Choice: Evidence from the Finnish Great Depression," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(1), pages 133-166, February.
    30. Vikash Ramiah, 2012. "The Impact of International Terrorist Attacks on the Risk and Return of Malaysian Equity Portfolios," Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies (RPBFMP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 15(04), pages 1-26.
    31. Hui-Ju Tsai & Yangru Wu, 2015. "Optimal portfolio choice with asset return predictability and nontradable labor income," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 215-249, July.
    32. Robert B. Barsky & F. Thomas Juster & Miles S. Kimball & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1997. "Preference Parameters and Behavioral Heterogeneity: An Experimental Approach in the Health and Retirement Study," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 537-579.
    33. Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R. & Puri, Manju, 2013. "Managerial attitudes and corporate actions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(1), pages 103-121.
    34. Bonaparte, Yosef & Kumar, Alok, 2013. "Political activism, information costs, and stock market participation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(3), pages 760-786.
    35. Vicki L. Bogan & Jose M. Fernandez, 2017. "How Children with Mental Disabilities Affect Household Investment Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 536-540, May.
    36. Puri, Manju & Robinson, David T., 2007. "Optimism and economic choice," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 71-99, October.
    37. Sanaz Aghazadeh & Lili Sun & Qian Wang & Rong Yang, 2018. "Investors’ perception of CEO overconfidence: evidence from the cost of equity capital," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 51(4), pages 1129-1150, November.
    38. Mark Grinblatt & Matti Keloharju & Juhani Linnainmaa, 2011. "IQ and Stock Market Participation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(6), pages 2121-2164, December.
    39. Gennaro Bernile & Vineet Bhagwat & P. Raghavendra Rau, 2017. "What Doesn't Kill You Will Only Make You More Risk-Loving: Early-Life Disasters and CEO Behavior," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(1), pages 167-206, February.
    40. Vicki L. Bogan & Angela R. Fertig, 2013. "Portfolio Choice and Mental Health," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 17(3), pages 955-992.
    41. Tiedens, Larissa Z. & Linton, Susan, 2001. "Judgment under Emotional Uncertainty: The Effects of Specific Emotions and Their Associated Certainty Appraisals on Information Processing," Research Papers 1629, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.
    2. Guiso, Luigi & Sodini, Paolo, 2013. "Household Finance: An Emerging Field," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1397-1532, Elsevier.
    3. David Hirshleife, 2015. "Behavioral Finance," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 133-159, December.
    4. Jawad M. Addoum & George Korniotis & Alok Kumar, 2017. "Stature, Obesity, and Portfolio Choice," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(10), pages 3393-3413, October.
    5. Ya-Fang Cheng & Eugene Burgos Mutuc & Fu-Sheng Tsai & Kun-Hwa Lu & Chien-Ho Lin, 2018. "Social Capital and Stock Market Participation via Technologies: The Role of Households’ Risk Attitude and Cognitive Ability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-14, June.
    6. Lee, Boram & Rosenthal, Leonard & Veld, Chris & Veld-Merkoulova, Yulia, 2015. "Stock market expectations and risk aversion of individual investors," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 122-131.
    7. Kaustia, Markku & Conlin, Andrew & Luotonen, Niilo, 2023. "What drives stock market participation? The role of institutional, traditional, and behavioral factors," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    8. Barnes, Spencer, 2021. "Killing in the stock market: Evidence from organ donations," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C).
    9. Delis, Manthos D. & Dioikitopoulos, Evangelos V. & Ongena, Steven, 2023. "Population diversity and financial risk-taking," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    10. Nguyen, Hung T. & Pham, Mia Hang, 2021. "Air pollution and behavioral biases: Evidence from stock market anomalies," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(C).
    11. Xu, Ziyao & Ma, Junfeng & Li, Donghui & Fu, Wentao, 2022. "Religious beliefs and stock market participation: Evidence from urban households in China," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    12. Wen, Chufu & Zhao, Xinyu & Xu, Longhao & Yin, Hua, 2023. "Military experience and household stock market participation: Evidence from China," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    13. Peijnenburg, Kim & Parise, Gianpaolo, 2017. "Understanding the Determinants of Financial Outcomes and Choices: The Role of Noncognitive Abilities," CEPR Discussion Papers 11900, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    14. Bonaparte, Yosef & Khalaf, Sarah & Korniotis, George, 2022. "The Obama Effect: Heightened Risk Tolerance, Optimism, and Wealth Accumulation by Minorities after 2008," CEPR Discussion Papers 14264, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Niu, Geng & Wang, Qi & Li, Han & Zhou, Yang, 2020. "Number of brothers, risk sharing, and stock market participation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    16. Raslan Alzuabi & Sarah Brown & Mark N. Harris & Karl Taylor, 2024. "Modelling the composition of household portfolios: A latent class approach," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 57(1), pages 243-275, February.
    17. Korniotis, George & Bonaparte, Yosef & Kumar, Alok, 2020. "Income Risk and Stock Market Entry/Exit Decisions," CEPR Discussion Papers 15370, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Sias, Richard & Starks, Laura T. & Turtle, H.J., 2023. "The negativity bias and perceived return distributions: Evidence from a pandemic," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(3), pages 627-657.
    19. Pak, Tae-Young & Babiarz, Patryk, 2018. "Does cognitive aging affect portfolio choice?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 1-12.
    20. Luik, Marc-André & Steinhardt, Max Friedrich, 2016. "Immigrant-native differences in stockholding – The role of cognitive and non-cognitive skills," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(PA), pages 103-119.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Anxiety; Stock market participation; Investment decision; Asset allocation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D14 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Saving; Personal Finance

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:rqfnac:v:53:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s11156-018-0766-x. 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://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.