Risk taking, behavioral biases and genes: Results from 149 active investors

Recent evidence suggests that there is genetic basis for economic behaviors, including preferences for risk taking. We correlate variation in risk taking and behavioral biases with two genetic polymorphisms related to the uptake of dopamine and serotonin (7R+ DRD4 and s/s 5-HTTLPR), hypothesizing th...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of behavioral and experimental finance Vol. 6; pp. 93 - 100
Main Authors Anderson, Anders, Dreber, Anna, Vestman, Roine
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Elsevier B.V 01.06.2015
Subjects
Behavioral biases
DNA
Dopamine
Life expectancy
Risk taking
Serotonin
Behavioral biases
Dopamine
Life expectancy
D12
Serotonin
DNA
G02
Risk taking
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Summary:Recent evidence suggests that there is genetic basis for economic behaviors, including preferences for risk taking. We correlate variation in risk taking and behavioral biases with two genetic polymorphisms related to the uptake of dopamine and serotonin (7R+ DRD4 and s/s 5-HTTLPR), hypothesizing that they are positively (negatively) related to risk taking. We use a small but detailed sample of active investors where we combine survey data with DNA samples and data from Swedish tax records that give us objective information about actual economic choices. We find a positive (negative) relationship between the dopamine (serotonin) gene and life expectancy bias, but no other significant correlations between the two genes and behaviors, including risk taking and measures of equity holdings. We acknowledge that our tests suffer from low power originating from the small sample size, which warrants some caution when interpreting these results.
ISSN:2214-6350
2214-6369
2214-6350
DOI:10.1016/j.jbef.2015.04.002