TY - RPRT AU - Görlitz, Katja AU - Tamm, Marcus TI - Parenthood and Risk Preferences PY - 2015/Mar/ PB - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) CY - Bonn T2 - IZA Discussion Paper IS - 8947 UR - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp8947 AB - This study analyzes how risk attitudes change when individuals become parents using longitudinal data for a large and representative sample of individuals. The results show that men and women experience a considerable increase in risk aversion which already starts as early as two years before becoming a parent, is largest shortly after giving birth and disappears when the child becomes older. These findings show that parenthood leads to considerable changes in individual risk attitudes over time. Thus, analyses using risk preferences as the explanatory variable for economic outcomes should be careful in interpreting the findings as causal effects. KW - risk preferences KW - preference stability KW - parenthood KW - children KW - risk aversion KW - gender differences ER -