The role of personal interaction in the assessment of risk attitudes

•Personal interaction affects the assessment of risk attitudes.•No effects of personal interaction on the precision of the assessment.•Stereotypes in risk assessment are observed.•Assessments are affected by the assessor's own risk attitude.

Many decisions under uncertainty are delegated to professionals, such as financial advisors or medical doctors, requiring them to assess the risk attitudes of their clients or patients. To gain a better understanding of the potential factors influencing risk attitude assessments, the current study investigates the role of personal interaction in these assessments. Controlling for information transmitted, we find that personal interaction leads to more risk-averse assessments, but does neither harm nor benefit assessments in terms of precision. We replicate previous findings of stereotypes in risk preference predictions, and discuss the influence of the assessor's own risk attitude on her assessments.