Abstract
Anxiety is an emotion characterised by a state of distress over anticipated events. When we experience anxiety and worry, we are often generalised and unfocused. Therefore, anxiety can be either a short-term “state” by recognising a disturbing stimulus or a long-term personality “trait” in experiencing excessive worry and other anxiety symptoms in anticipation of future events. Studies of economic decision-making show the importance of emotions. Emotions such as anger or happiness will impact our decision-making when choosing, subsequently guiding our behaviour. Several studies have documented that state-trait anxiety impairs the ability to make economic decisions that maximise self-interest and engage in systematic behaviour. Most studies in the field of state-trait anxiety have only focused on the effects of trait anxiety rather than state anxiety. This thesis aimed to explore the effects of state anxiety on economic decision-making. This thesis addresses two research questions:(1) How does a short-term state of anxiety affect economic decision-making? Together with (2) How does a shortterm state of anxiety impact strategic economic decision-making behaviour?
The thesis has two studies. The first study addressed research question one, which used a psychological experiment presenting three hypothetical economic scenarios to answer how short-term anxiety affects economic decision-making. The second study addressed research question two, which adopted an economic experiment to test the insights from the psychological experiment to determine if state anxiety can shape strategic decisions and behaviour. The results from experiment one showed that exposure to three types of hypothetical economic scenarios revealed differences in the number of unconditional contributions to the public pot and state anxiety experienced with no differences in mood. The second experiment identified that economic agents use information efficiently, without state anxiety to guide their behaviour. It was objective and cooperative, making economic decisions unconditionally and collectively to the public pot.
The significant implications for future research are that economic agents could use information efficiently by applying state anxiety to make an economic decision, discussed at greater length in the thesis. The findings presented in this thesis add to our understanding of using emotions to guide behaviour and drive economic decision-making.
| Date of Award | Aug 2024 |
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| Original language | English |
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| Supervisor | Daniel Santamaria (Supervisor), Eliana Lauretta (Supervisor), Andre Soares (Supervisor) & Anna Cartwright (Supervisor) |