The impact of neurotransmitters, emotional intelligence, and personality traits on individual investors' investment decisions: an empirical comparative study

There is a concern toward determining the neural basis that affects investment decisions and linking them with the emotional and cognitive limitations of human beings. The current study proposes the construction of a framework that links neurotransmitters, emotional intelligence, and personality traits. The study introduces the theoretical link behind these variables and validates it using an empirical study. The study tests the impact of these variables on individual investors' investment decisions using two samples of different characteristics (Egyptian and international) to examine the change in the significant variables when changing the investment environment. The results confirmed the fitness of the developed construct, while the significant variables are emotional intelligence and epinephrine hormone of the neurotransmitters in both samples. Also, dopamine hormone of the neurotransmitters is only significant for the international sample while two out of the five examined personality traits are significant for the Egyptian sample.