Risk aversion among 9-year-old children

Julie Fuzat & James Riviere

Introduction:
There are two types of behavior in front of risky
situations : either people avoid it, risk aversion, or
look for it, showing risk appetence (Khaneman &
Tversky, 1982). Young children are risk appetent. But
when they turn 8 years old, they slowly become risk
averse (Paulsen, Platt, Huettel & Brannon, 2011).
When does risk-seeking behavior decrease ? Is 9 year-
old a transitional age for risk aversion ?
University of Normandy
Results
9-year-old are risk appetent. They
are as appetent as 7-year-old
Method (Haun, Nawroth & Call, 2011)
children. Among the total of 96
Children had the choice between a risky option with 4 mini
trials, only 5 were risk averse.
chocolates as rewards and a safe option with a reward of 1
Only one child chose the risk
mini chocolate. Each child had 4 trials to do.
averse option twice.
The results of the 9-year-old were compared with results of
7-year-old children collected by Emilie Dehant.

Hypothesis Hypothesis
9-year-old children will have a low percentage of risk Discussion
9-year-old children will manifest risk averse behavior.
seeking choices. The results are not the same as
Paulsen, Platt, Huettel and
Brannon (2011). It might be
because they studied american
Participants children. Culture has an influence
24 children (mean age was 9 years old and 2 days) parcipated on the attitude toward risk (Hsee
to this study. They were recruited in the Saint-Adjutor and Weber, 1999).
primary school. In respect of article 46 and 49 of the Moreover, the two task that are
deontology code, parents authorized their children to be part used are different. The task has an
of this experiment and allowed us to film their children's effect on the risk propension
responses. (Rolinson, Honoch and Wood,
2012).
Rewards have an effect too. Our
References
Haun, D. B., Nawroth, C., & Call, J. (2011). PLoS ONE, 6(12).
reward may have trigger the
Hsee, C. K. & Weber, E. U. (1999). Journal of behavioral decision making, 12, 165-179. "peanut effect" : participants are
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Paulsen, D. J., Platt, M . L., Huettel, S. A. & Brannon, E. M . (2011). Frontiers in psychology, 2.
Rolison, J. J., Honoch, Y. & Wood, S. (2012). Psychology and Aging, 27(1), 129-140. reward is insignificant to them
Weber, B. J., & Chapman, G. B. (2005). Organizational Behavior and Human Decision (Weber and Chapman, 2005).
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