Author(s)

Scott Henderson¹, Gillian Hyde², Simmy Grover¹, Adrian Furnham³

¹Department of Clinical, Educational, and Health Psychology, University College London, London, UK.
²PCL Tunbridge-Wells, Tunbridge Wells, England.
³Norwegian Business School (BI), Nydalveien, Olso, Norway.

This study focused on the risk-taking styles of people in different professional groups, with a focus on finance, compared to other occupational groups. A new risk-oriented personality questionnaire (Risk Type Compass) focusing on emotional and cognitive aspects of risk tolerance was used to analyse organisational groups, including financial markets traders. In all, 3592 professionals from different groups (e.g. HR, Engineering, Finance) completed the questionnaire. There were clear and interpretable differences between the groups. In a second study we contrasted the risk profiles of student and qualified groups in trading and finance. The findings support previous evidence that, in work settings, risk management is more important than risk-taking. There is a relative scarcity of research into occupational risk-taking and suggestions for further study into risk management, and counter-productive risk-taking are provided. Limitations and implications were discussed.

Risk-Style, Finance, Traders, Cognitive, Emotional

Henderson, S. , Hyde, G. , Grover, S. and Furnham, A. (2021) Risk-Taking in Professional Groups. Psychology, 12, 1127-1140. doi: 10.4236/psych.2021.127069.