A body of qualitative evidence shows that loss aversion, a phenomenon formalized in prospect theory, can explain a variety of field and experimental data. Quantifications of loss aversion are, however, hindered by the absence of a general preference-based method to elicit the utility for gains and losses simultaneously. This paper proposes such a method and uses it to measure loss aversion in a...

We match data on performance in a multiple-choice examination with risk preferences from classroom experiment. Students who are more loss averse leave questions unanswered and perform worse the exam when an incorrect answer is penalized compared no answer. Thus, aversion parameters extracted lottery choices controlled experiment have predictive power field environment of decision-making under u...