Tom Leonhardt is a student at Martin-Luther-Universitt Halle- Wittenberg.
Many studies in behavioral sciences use students as a test subject. The full picture about people is not revealed when only students are used. Many of the students' decisions are different from those of other people. A team of behavioral scientists from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg conducted 36 experiments to come up with these results. The study was published in a journal.
Behavioral economics is a popular test subject for students. Students are open to and interested in scientific studies, they are already in a university setting, and also they are receptive to financial incentives offered in those studies. It's not clear whether students are representative of other groups, such as age and income.
300 test subjects were used to answer the question. Students can only draw limited conclusions about the behavior of other people.
Grner compared the decisions of agricultural science students to those made by farmers. The team looked at individual characteristics such as risk-taking, impatience, altruism, trust, punishing unfair and rewarding generosity. Grner says that they used economic experiments from game theory.
The test subjects were given a choice between a higher chance of winning a small amount of money and a lower chance of winning a large amount of money. The monetary incentives were increased to see how the expected sum influenced the decisions. The incentive was given to the subjects because they might have shown more socially desirable behavior if they knew they wouldn't get any money.
There are no clear differences between the groups when it comes to taking risks. Students are more risk averse than farmers according to previous studies. There were slight differences when it came to trusting and rewarding generosity.
Farmers were more likely to choose the option with the higher probability of a lower pay out, while students were more patient and waited for more money. Farmers turned down unfair offers more often because they wouldn't get any money of their own. Grner says that the finding is not in line with previous studies that showed similar behavior among students.
It's problematic to generalize the behavior of students to other people. Grner says that this could call into question the results of previous studies.
It's a sensitive topic because surveys on individual decision-making examine important questions about the future, such as risk behavior and patience, which are important criteria for investing in sustainable production structures that usually only pay off after a long time. Factors that can be used to weight the results are identified in the study.
More information: Sven Grüner et al, How (un)informative are experiments with students for other social groups? A study of agricultural students and farmers, Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics (2022). DOI: 10.1111/1467-8489.12485 Provided by Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg
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