Size doesn't really matter: ambiguity aversion in Ellsberg urns with few balls.

نویسندگان

  • Briony D Pulford
  • Andrew M Colman
چکیده

When attempting to draw a ball of a specified color either from an urn containing 50 red balls and 50 black balls or from an urn containing an unknown ratio of 100 red and black balls, a majority of decision makers prefer the known-risk urn, and this ambiguity aversion effect violates expected utility theory. In an experimental investigation of the effect of urn size on ambiguity aversion, 149 participants showed similar levels of aversion when choosing from urns containing 2, 10, or 100 balls. The occurrence of a substantial and significant ambiguity aversion effect even in the smallest urn suggests that influential theoretical interpretations of ambiguity aversion may need to be reconsidered.

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

منابع مشابه

Is luck on my side? Optimism, pessimism, and ambiguity aversion.

The influences of optimism and pessimism on ambiguity aversion were investigated in two tasks that manipulated the presence or absence of a potentially competitive experimenter. A total of 112 participants chose which option--ambiguous or known-risk--they preferred in the two slightly differing Ellsberg urns tasks. Optimism was measured using the Extended Life Orientation Test (ELOT). Highly op...

متن کامل

Ambiguity aversion and household portfolio choice puzzles: Empirical evidence.

We test the relation between ambiguity aversion and five household portfolio choice puzzles: nonparticipation in equities, low allocations to equity, home-bias, own-company stock ownership, and portfolio under-diversification. In a representative US household survey, we measure ambiguity preferences using custom-designed questions based on Ellsberg urns. As theory predicts, ambiguity aversion i...

متن کامل

Ambiguity and Ambiguity Aversion

Consider the following choice problem, known as “Ellsberg’s three-color urn example”, or simply the “Ellsberg Paradox” (Ellsberg [7]). An urn contains 30 red balls, and 60 green and blue balls, in unspecified proportions; subjects are asked to compare (i) a bet on a red draw vs. a bet on a green draw, and (ii) a bet on a red or blue draw vs. a bet on a green or blue draw. If the subject wins a ...

متن کامل

Ambiguity aversion, games against nature, and dynamic consistency

Several papers, adopting an axiomatic approach to study decision making under ambiguity aversion, have produced conflicting predictions about how decision makers would behave in simple dynamic urn problems. We explore the concepts of ambiguity aversion and dynamic consistency, with examples of dynamic games against nature. Basically, a malevolent nature puts balls into the urn, and a fair natur...

متن کامل

Testosterone and Cortisol Jointly Predict the Ambiguity Premium in an Ellsberg-Urns Experiment

Previous literature has tried to establish whether and how steroid hormones are related to economic risk-taking. In this study, we investigate the relationship between testosterone (T) and cortisol (C) on one side and attitudes toward risk and ambiguity on the other. We asked 78 male undergraduate students to complete several tasks and provide two saliva samples. In the task "Reveal the Bag," p...

متن کامل

ذخیره در منابع من


  با ذخیره ی این منبع در منابع من، دسترسی به آن را برای استفاده های بعدی آسان تر کنید

برای دانلود متن کامل این مقاله و بیش از 32 میلیون مقاله دیگر ابتدا ثبت نام کنید

ثبت نام

اگر عضو سایت هستید لطفا وارد حساب کاربری خود شوید

عنوان ژورنال:
  • Experimental psychology

دوره 55 1  شماره 

صفحات  -

تاریخ انتشار 2008