Disposition Effect (DE) is one type of irrational behaviors referring to the tendency that sells assets that have gained value ("winners") and keep assets that have lost value ("losers"). Disposition effect can make an investor’ stock portfolio biased towards low growth-potential stocks. If happening on a large scale among investors, DE will cause low returns on investment. Previous studies largely explored the causes of DE, including investors’ personalities, age, income, living culture, previous investment experience, education level and etc.

According to recent public news, gender was found significant when comparing investment performances between males and females. A 2017 Fidelity study found that women actually outperformed men by 40 basis points per year. However, in academia, the relationship between gender and DE has not been fully exanimated. Fragmented research efforts were found. However, some of them yielded conflicting conclusions. In this study, to fully understand the relationship between investors’ gender and the level of disposition effect, we designed a lab experiment with a mobile app to simulate and track investors’ behaviors. In addition, we took investors’ personalities, investment experience, age and education level into account. According to our pilot experiment, we found that in China females are more likely to have disposition effect, but the effect moderated by education level and whether having a STEM education
background.