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We test the effect of stake size on ambiguity attitudes. Compared to a baseline condition, we find subjects to be more ambiguity seeking for small-probability gains and large-probability losses under high stakes. They are also more ambiguity averse for large-probability gains and small-probability losses. We trace these effects back to stake effects on decisions under risk (known probabilities) and uncertainty (unknown probabilities). For risk, we replicate previous findings. For uncertainty, we find an increase in probabilistic insensitivity under high stakes that is driven by increased uncertainty aversion for large-probability gains and for small-probability losses.

AbstractGender effects in risk taking have attracted much attention by economists, and remain debated. Loss aversion—the stylized finding that a given loss carries substantially greater weight than a monetarily equivalent gain—is a fundamental driver of risk aversion. We deploy four definitions of loss aversion commonly used in the literature to investigate gender effects. Even though the definitions only differ in subtle ways, we find women to be more loss averse than men according to one definition, while another definition results in no gender differences, and the remaining two definitions point to women beinglessloss averse than men. Conceptually, these contradictory effects can be organized by systematic measurement error resulting from model mis-specifications relative to the true underlying decision process.

Attitudes towards uncertainty have been indicated to be highly context-dependent, and to be sensitive to the measurement technique employed. We present data collected in controlled experiments with 2939 subjects in 30 countries measuring uncertainty attitudes through incentivized measures as well as survey questions. Our data show clearly that measures correlate not only within decision context or measurements methods, but also across contexts and methods. This points to the existance of one underlying "risk preference", which influences attitudes independently of the measurement method or choice domain. We furthermore find that answers to a general survey question correlate with incentivized lottery choices in most countries. Much more surprisingly, incentivized and survey measures also correlate significantly between countries. This opens the possibility to conduct cultural comparisons on risk attitudes using survey instruments. (author's abstract)