Basics Beginner: Psychology and Investing

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1.
When you judge an investment by objective standards rather than your own personal ones, you are practicing what is called "anchoring."
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False. Anchoring is the other way around, and in some cases it can lead to costly losses.
2.
If you are holding two beliefs that are seemingly at odds with each other and you are uncomfortable doing so, then you are suffering from _______.
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Cognitive dissonance. Because of the discomfort, you will need a way to resolve the dissonance.
3.
In investing, sunk costs refer to costs that have already been incurred.
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True. If the costs of an investment are high, we might become reluctant to dump it due to how much we have put into it.
4.
In investing, overconfidence means thinking that we are more capable than we really are.
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True. Overconfidence is an unhealthy extension of confidence.
5.
The practice of herding refers to _______.
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Going along with the crowd. This is the practice of buying and selling based on the fact that it is popular to do so at the time.
6.
If you find yourself habitually buying shares of a company that has treated you well in the past, even when the data suggest it would be unwise, you could be operating under confirmation bias.
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True. Though its not always a bad thing, investing against the reality of the company can sometimes be detrimental.
7.
Self-handicapping bias occurs when we _______.
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Think of excuses before we do something to justify failure just in case it happens. These excuses can sabotage our performance.
8.
What is a good way as an investor to avoid falling prey to the framing effect?
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Consider the total return of your investments. Seeing your choice in terms of the total return can help you avoid framing it in relative terms, which can be costly.
9.
With regard to investing behavior, mental accounting refers to following the crowd.
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False. Mental accounting refers to keeping ones money in different buckets for different purposes.
10.
What does regret often lead to?
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Making a bad sell decision because youve confused a bad outcome with a bad decision. You may feel regret after a bad outcome, such as a stretch of weak performance from a given stock, even if you chose the investment for all the right reasons and the underlying business remains strong. Regret can lead you to make a bad sell decision.