Political Identity and Financial Risk Taking: Insights from Social Dominance Orientation

<jats:p>This article investigates how people’s political identity is associated with their financial risk taking. The authors argue that conservatives’ financial risk taking increases as their self-efficacy increases because of their greater social dominance orientation, whereas liberals’ financial risk taking is invariant to their self-efficacy. This central hypothesis is verified in six studies using different measures of political identity, self-efficacy, and financial risk taking. The studies also use different samples of U.S. consumers, including online panels, a large-scale data set spanning five election cycles, and a secondary data set of political donations made by managers at companies. Finally, the authors articulate and demonstrate the mediating effect of individuals’ focus on the upside potential of a decision among conservatives but not liberals.</jats:p>