Brave Boys and Play-it-Safe Girls: Gender Differences in Willingness to Guess in a Large Scale Natural Field Experiment
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SeriesResearch on Monday
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Speaker(s)Nagore Iriberri (University of Basque Country, Spain)
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FieldBehavioral Economics
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LocationErasmus University, Theil building, Room C1-1
Rotterdam -
Date and time
October 21, 2019
12:00 - 13:00
Abstract:
Multiple-choice tests are widely
used to measure individuals’ knowledge and aptitude. We study gender
differences in willingness to guess using approximately 10,000 multiple-choice
math tests, where for half of the questions, both wrong answers and omitted
questions are scored 0, and for the other half, wrong answers are scored 0 but
omitted questions are scored +1. Using a within-participant regression
analysis, we find that female participants leave significantly more omitted
questions than males when there is a reward for omitted questions. This gender
difference, which is stronger among high ability and older participants, hurts
female performance as measured by the final score and position in the ranking.
In a subsequent survey, female participants showed lower levels of confidence
and higher risk aversion, which may explain this differential behavior. When
both are considered, risk aversion is the main factor explaining the gender
differential in the willingness to guess. A scoring rule that is gender neutral
must use non-differential scoring between wrong answers and omitted questions.