The relationship of individual investment preferences and behavioral finance concept: Shoe manufacturing sector employees and employers the case of Izmir

Financial decisions made by individuals are not always rational. Individual investors can be affected by more than one factor while making an investment decision. The decision made by the investor unconsciously or consciously while making a financial decision constitutes the basis of "behavioral finance". Investors' decisions may change with the condition of winning and losing at various risk levels. At the same time, the socio-demographic characteristics of the investor such as "age, gender, marital status, educational status" affect investment decisions. The aim of this study is to evaluate individual investor decisions within the framework of behavioral finance and to examine investors' financial profiles and psychological tendencies according to the demographic characteristics of investors. 125 employers and employees working in businesses operating in the shoe manufacturing sector in İzmir were included in this research. In the research, a questionnaire was applied to the investors in the shoe manufacturing sector. In the research, data were obtained by using the demographic information form and the "Behavioral Finance Scale". In practice, the data of 125 investors were analyzed in the SPSS 24 program. Frequency analysis, validity analysis and analysis of variance were used as analysis methods. The results obtained were considered significant with p<0.05 at the 95% confidence interval. According to the research findings, the mean DFS score of the participants was found to be 3.18±0.50. It was determined that the sub-scores ranged between 2.57 and 3.59, and the total score averages of the scale did not differ according to the demographic variables. While no significant differences were observed between the DFS sub-dimensions and the participants' age, position in the workplace, investment market preference and investment size, significant differences were found between the gender and lost earnings status and the "Optimistic and Self-Belief Effect" sub-dimension and the "Conservatism Effect on Decision" sub-dimension of the preferred markets. has been done. As a result of the research, it is seen that investors have behavioral finance tendencies, albeit at a weak level. It has been determined that investors are not very rational while making their investment choices and are under the influence of psychological biases. It has been determined that investors have an optimistic attitude about winning but a conservative attitude about losses. Keywords: Behavioral finance, ındividual ınvestor, heuristic.