INVESTMENT DECISIONS AND THE THEORY OF PLANNED BEHAVIOR

Three studies of application for shares in privatised British industri es are reported. Study 1 was on the regional electricity companies, St udy 2 was on the electricity generating companies and Study 3 was on t he second tranche of shares in British Telecom. The studies applied Aj zen's ( 1991 ) theory of planned behaviour. In each case the applicati on for shares was accurately predicted by measured intention. Intentio n was in turn explained by attitude, subjective norm, perceived contro l and past behaviour. At a more specific level the research demonstrat ed the strong influence of friends and relatives and the importance of easy access to funds as well as the financial criteria of profit and security of investment. The research was used to test aspects of plann ed behaviour theory and two matters were considered in detail. The fir st matter was the conditions under which a measure of perceived contro l improved on the prediction of behaviour obtained from intention alon e. The second matter was the association between product sum variables and globally meaSured variables; in the theory these are equated but rather low correlations are often found.