'How I Think You Are Investing': Gendered, Social Metacognitive Influences on Consumers’ Investing Perspectives

Abstract

Marketplace social metacognition concerns how consumers think about other consumers in the marketplace and how those others make decisions. We apply this perspective to the consideration of gender stereotypes in relation to investing decision scenarios involving potential gains and losses, as suggested by prospect and house money investing theories. In an experimental study of 84 business school students we find that target-investor order of gender presentation (i.e., the gender of an imagined investor with either a male or female presented first) was more predictive than one’s own gender in terms of both amounts invested and investing processes engaged in by male as opposed to female target-investors across gain and loss scenarios. Our findings suggest possible revisions in relating gender stereotype theory to both social metacognition and behaviorally diagnostic investing information.