Abstract

This study investigates the differential effect of anger and fear on investors information search behavior. Based on theories from psychology, I predict that angry investors will seek out less additional information and exert a lower depth of thought than fearful investors after a negative earnings surprise. Additionally, I predict that these differences will be moderated in investors that exhibit higher levels of emotion management ability. Using an experiment, I find that neither anger nor fear had any effect on the number of additional information sources investors access. However, angry investors processed information less deeply than fearful investors. This is evident by significant differences in the amount of time spent reading additional information and the ability to recall details about the information. Finally, high emotion management ability reduces differences in depth of thought for both angry and fearful investors. The results of this study have implications for investors and researchers.

摘要

本研究调查愤怒和恐惧对投资者信息搜索行为的不同影响。根据心理学理论，我预测愤怒的投资者在收益意外负增长后，会比恐惧的投资者寻求更少的额外信息并发挥更低的思考深度。此外，我预测这些差异将在表现出较高情绪管理能力的投资者中得到缓和。通过实验，我发现愤怒和恐惧都不会对投资者获取的额外信息来源数量产生任何影响。然而，愤怒的投资者处理信息的深度不如恐惧的投资者。阅读附加信息所花费的时间和回忆有关信息的详细信息的能力存在显着差异，这一点很明显。最后，高情绪管理能力减少了愤怒和恐惧投资者的思维深度差异。这项研究的结果对投资者和研究人员有影响。