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Are Women Really More Risk-Averse Than Men? A Re-Analysis Of The Literature Using Expanded Methods, Julie Nelson
Are Women Really More Risk-Averse Than Men? A Re-Analysis Of The Literature Using Expanded Methods, Julie Nelson
Julie A. Nelson
While a substantial literature in economics and finance has concluded that “women are more risk averse than men,” this conclusion merits investigation. After briefly clarifying the difference between making generalizations about groups, on the one hand, and making valid inferences from samples, on the other, this essay suggests improvements to how economists communicate our research results. Supplementing findings of statistical significance with quantitative measures of both substantive difference (Cohen's d, a measure in common use in non-‐Economics literatures) and of substantive overlap (the Index of Similarity, newly proposed here) adds important nuance to the discussion of sex differences. These measures …
State Of The Urban Youth, India 2012, Professor Vibhuti Patel
State Of The Urban Youth, India 2012, Professor Vibhuti Patel
Professor Vibhuti Patel
State of the Urban Youth India 2012: Employment, Livelihoods, Skills Executive Summary Every third person in urban India is a youth. In less than a decade from now, India, with a median age of 29 years will be the youngest nation in the world. India’s demographic transformation is creating an opportunity for the demographic burden of the past to be converted to a dividend for the future. For this to happen the country needs to adopt a three-pronged policy that will address the issues of employment, livelihoods and the skill status of youth. The State of the Urban Youth India …
Not-So-Strong Evidence For Gender Differences In Risk, Julie Nelson
Not-So-Strong Evidence For Gender Differences In Risk, Julie Nelson
Julie A. Nelson
In their article "Strong Evidence for Gender Differences in Risk Taking," Gary Charness and Uri Gneezy (2012) review a number of experimental studies regarding investments in risky assets, and claim that these yield strong evidence that females are more risk averse than males. This study replicates and extends their article, demonstrating that its methods are highly problematic. While the methods used would be appropriate for categorical, individual-‐level differences, the data reviewed are not consistent with such a model. Instead, modest differences (at most) exist only at aggregate levels, such as group means. The evidence in favor of gender difference is …
Fearing Fear: Gender And Economic Discourse, Julie Nelson
Fearing Fear: Gender And Economic Discourse, Julie Nelson
Julie A. Nelson
Economic discourse—or the lack of it—about fear is gendered on at least three fronts. First, while masculine-‐associated notions of reason and mind have historically been prioritized in mainstream economics, fear—along with other emotions and embodiment—has tended to be culturally associated with femininity. Research on cognitive "gender schema," then, may at least partly explain the near absence of discussions of fear within economic research. Second, in the rare cases where fear is discussed in the contemporary economics literature, there is a tendency to (overly-‐)strongly associate it with women. Finally, historians and philosophers of science have suggested that the failure to consider …
The Power Of Stereotyping And Confirmation Bias To Overwhelm Accurate Assessment: The Case Of Economics, Gender, And Risk Aversion, Julie A. Nelson
The Power Of Stereotyping And Confirmation Bias To Overwhelm Accurate Assessment: The Case Of Economics, Gender, And Risk Aversion, Julie A. Nelson
Julie A. Nelson
Behavioral research has revealed how normal human cognitive processes can tend to lead us astray. But do these affect economic researchers, ourselves? This article explores the consequences of stereotyping and confirmation bias using a sample of published articles from the economics literature on gender and risk aversion. The results demonstrate that the supposedly “robust” claim that “women are more risk averse than men” is far less empirically supported than has been claimed. The questions of how these cognitive biases arise and why they have such power are discussed, and methodological practices that may help to attenuate these biases are outlined.