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Introduction
The financial crisis that erupted in 2008 has become an oft-used backdrop for research, and interest in different aspects of consumer finance has grown ([63] Tufano, 2009). The field of consumer finance has also attracted interest because of the increasing emphasis placed on self-responsibility for building up retirement wealth in the USA and Europe, including Sweden[1] . Further investigation of financial decision making has been called for ([52] Raghubir and Das, 2010; [44] Lynch, 2011), and two specific areas in which research is scarce are the relationship between consumers and expert advisors and the impact of financial advice ([47] Mullainathan et al. , 2012; [33] Inderst, 2011; [68] West, 2012) on consumer decisions.
Financial advisors might aid in reducing consumer uncertainty and in educating consumers about financial risk in general and their personal financial possibilities in particular. However, it is important to remember that financial advisors are salespeople and that this conflict of interest is not always recognised by consumers ([56] Schwartz et al. , 2011). In an audit study, [47] Mullainathan et al. (2012) showed how the advice market exaggerates biases instead of mitigating them. Advisors might have an incentive to recommend asset allocations that are not commensurable with investor risk preferences ([34] Jansen et al. , 2008). [34] Jansen et al. (2008), among others (e.g. [15] Campbell et al. , 2011; [39] Levine, 2012), concluded that there is a need for better legislative protection of consumers.
Professional financial advice plays an important role in the market for retail financial services but has not yet been explored in-depth in the academic literature ([33] Inderst, 2011), despite the fact that important policy implications exist for research on consumer contact with the financial industry ([3] Akinbami, 2011). This paper answers the call for more knowledge about the role of financial advisors in consumer financial decision making. More specifically, relationships between advisor characteristics and consumer perceptions are investigated because they are considered to be factors that might affect the practice of financial advisory services and because there is a lack of relevant literature.
The purpose of the present study on the relationship between buyer and seller in financial advisory services is to investigate whether gender and mood of financial advisors are related to the amount of...