The Behavioral Biases of Individuals

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Categories of Behavioral Biases5 min
Behavioral biases are broadly classified into Cognitive Errors and Emotional Biases. Cognitive errors result from faulty reasoning or memory errors and are essentially 'blind spots' in human thinking. Because they are rooted in logic failures, they can often be corrected or eliminated through education, better information, and advice. Emotional biases, in contrast, stem from feelings, impulses, and intuition. Because they are psychological and deeply ingrained, they are harder to correct. In wealth management, emotional biases often need to be accommodated rather than eliminated.

Key Points

  • Cognitive Errors: Faulty reasoning, can be corrected.
  • Emotional Biases: Based on feelings/impulse, harder to correct.
  • Cognitive Errors are split into Belief Perseverance and Processing Errors.
Cognitive Errors: Belief Perseverance10 min
Belief Perseverance biases involve the tendency to cling to previously held beliefs. Key biases include: Conservatism (maintaining prior views by underweighing new info), Confirmation (seeking info that confirms beliefs), Representativeness (classifying info based on surface similarities, leading to base-rate or sample-size neglect), Illusion of Control (believing one can influence uncontrollable outcomes, leading to concentrated portfolios), and Hindsight Bias (viewing past events as predictable).

Key Points

  • Conservatism: Under-reaction to new information.
  • Confirmation: Ignoring contradictory evidence.
  • Representativeness: Base-rate neglect and sample-size neglect.
  • Illusion of Control: Leads to under-diversification.
  • Hindsight: Overestimating prediction accuracy ex-post.
Cognitive Errors: Processing Errors8 min
Processing errors arise from how information is analyzed or presented. Anchoring and Adjustment occurs when an initial value (anchor) unduly influences the final estimate. Mental Accounting involves separating money into subjective 'buckets' (e.g., income vs. capital), often ignoring correlations and portfolio efficiency. Framing bias sees decisions change based on whether the context is positive (gain) or negative (loss). Availability bias leads to estimating probabilities based on how easily information is recalled (retrievability, resonance).

Key Points

  • Anchoring: Sticking too close to initial numbers.
  • Mental Accounting: Ignoring correlations by bucketing funds.
  • Framing: Decisions influenced by gain/loss context.
  • Availability: Recency or resonance drives probability estimates.
Emotional Biases12 min
Emotional biases are driven by impulse. Loss Aversion is the strong preference to avoid losses, often leading investors to hold losing positions too long and sell winners too soon (disposition effect). Overconfidence involves overestimating one's knowledge or ability, often fueled by self-attribution bias, leading to excessive trading and risk-taking. Self-Control bias is the failure to act for long-term goals due to lack of discipline. Status Quo bias is the inertia to change. Endowment bias is valuing an asset more simply because it is owned. Regret Aversion causes investors to be too conservative or herd with others to avoid the pain of a wrong decision.

Key Points

  • Loss Aversion: Pain of loss > pleasure of gain.
  • Overconfidence: Underestimating risk, overestimating returns.
  • Self-Control: Prioritizing current consumption.
  • Endowment: Overvaluing owned assets.
  • Regret Aversion: Herding or excessive conservatism.
Behavioral Finance and Market Behavior5 min
Individual biases aggregate to explain market anomalies. Momentum (trending) is observed where future prices correlate with the recent past. Bubbles are often driven by overconfidence, where investors trade excessively and underestimate risk. When bubbles unwind, markets may under-react initially due to anchoring, as investors suffering from cognitive dissonance ignore the losses to rationalize their flawed decisions.

Key Points

  • Momentum: Positive correlation with recent past prices.
  • Bubbles: Driven by overconfidence and dismissal of contradictory info.
  • Crashes: Under-reaction due to anchoring and cognitive dissonance.

Questions

Question 1

Which category of behavioral biases is primarily characterized by faulty cognitive reasoning?

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Question 2

Which type of behavioral bias is generally considered harder to correct or eliminate?

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Question 3

Conservatism bias is best described as a tendency to do which of the following?

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Question 4

In Bayesian terms, an investor exhibiting conservatism bias will tend to do what?

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Question 5

Which bias involves looking for and noticing what confirms prior beliefs while ignoring what contradicts them?

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Question 6

An employee holding a disproportionate amount of their investment assets in their employing company's stock due to a belief in its favorable prospects is an example of which bias?

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Question 7

Which of the following is a sub-type of Representativeness bias?

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Question 8

Sample-size neglect occurs when an investor does which of the following?

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Question 9

Which bias leads investors to believe they can influence outcomes when they actually cannot?

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Question 10

A common consequence of Illusion of Control bias is which of the following?

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Question 11

Hindsight bias refers to the tendency to view past events as having been:

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Question 12

Which question can help an investor overcome Hindsight bias?

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Question 13

Anchoring and Adjustment bias is classified as which type of bias?

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Question 14

In the context of Anchoring and Adjustment bias, individuals generally adjust their anchors:

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Question 15

Mental Accounting bias involves dividing money into accounts that:

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Question 16

A primary drawback of Mental Accounting is that:

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Question 17

Framing bias is an information-processing bias where a person answers a question differently based on:

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Question 18

Availability bias occurs when people estimate the probability of an outcome based on:

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Question 19

Which of the following is a source of Availability bias related to how closely a situation parallels a personal situation?

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Question 20

Loss-aversion bias leads people to typically:

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Question 21

A specific behavior resulting from loss aversion is:

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Question 22

Overconfidence bias is often intensified when combined with which other bias?

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Question 23

Which of the following is a common consequence of Overconfidence bias?

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Question 24

Self-control bias is characterized by a failure to:

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Question 25

Which bias explains why an investor might choose to do nothing rather than make a warranted change?

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Question 26

Endowment bias involves valuing an asset more when:

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Question 27

To detect Endowment bias regarding inherited securities, an advisor should ask:

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Question 28

Regret-aversion bias can cause investors to be:

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Question 29

Which market behavior is characterized by future price behavior correlating with the recent past?

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Question 30

In financial bubbles, investors often exhibit symptoms of which bias?

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Question 31

When a market bubble unwinds, under-reaction may occur because investors suffering from cognitive dissonance do what?

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Question 32

To overcome Confirmation bias, what should an investor actively seek?

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Question 33

Which bias is described as relying on an initial piece of information to make subsequent estimates?

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Question 34

Which of the following describes 'Narrow Range of Experience' as a source of Availability bias?

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Question 35

Which bias might cause an investor to irrationally bifurcate wealth into 'principal' and 'returns'?

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Question 36

Self-attribution bias leads people to:

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Question 37

Which of the following is a recommended method to overcome Overconfidence bias?

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Question 38

Regret-aversion bias has two dimensions regarding actions people take and:

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Question 39

Herding behavior is often a consequence of which bias?

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Question 40

Cognitive dissonance is the mental discomfort that occurs when:

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Question 41

Which bias results in 'Narrow frame of reference'—losing sight of the big picture?

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Question 42

Which of the following is a detection/overcoming strategy for Conservatism bias?

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Question 43

Which bias may cause an investor to misidentify their risk tolerance because of how the questions were asked?

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Question 44

The 'Disposition Effect' (selling winners, holding losers) is primarily a manifestation of which bias?

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Question 45

Which bias involves 'Prediction Overconfidence' and 'Certainty Overconfidence'?

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Question 46

What is a recommended strategy to mitigate Self-Control bias?

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Question 47

If an investor chooses an investment fund solely based on recent advertising or news coverage, they are likely exhibiting:

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Question 48

The tendency of investors to unknowingly maintain portfolios with risk characteristics inappropriate for their circumstances due to inertia is called:

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Question 49

Which bias is characterized by constructing financial models that are overly detailed, believing this manages uncertainty?

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Question 50

When assessing risk tolerance, financial market participants (FMPs) should quantify the risk-reducing advantages of diversification to overcome:

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