语言将来时态标记特征与公司股利政策——基于投资者语言认知效应的跨国研究

The Future-tense Reference Characteristic of Language and Corporate Dividend Policy:A Cross-country Study Based on Cognitive Effect of Investors

近年来,学术界开始关注语言影响个体决策的认知效应。本文研究语法结构中的将来时态标记(FTR)是否影响股东对未来收益时间的感知,进而影响公司的股利政策。研究发现:首先,在不强制要求区分现在和将来时态(弱FTR)的语言环境中,公司的现金股利支付率较低。其次,控制长期价值导向这一文化维度并未改变本文结论,而较高的股东受教育水平和机构持股比例通过提升股东整体理性程度、缓解时间信息的认知差异,削弱了FTR与股利支付的关系,说明FTR可以通过认知机制影响决策。再者,通过研究在美国发行ADRs的其他国家(地区)样本表明,使用强FTR语言的股东比例上升会使企业提高股利支付率。最后,当企业的研发支出和无形资产越多、代理问题越严重,使得企业收益不确定性更高时,使用弱FTR语言的股东会增加对股利的诉求。本文结论在控制其他语言特征与交互固定效应、选取公元前1500年的粮食产量作为工具变量和以1997年香港回归事件构建DID模型等内生性检验下仍然成立。本文实证检验了语言的认知效应,为单一制度背景下语言经济学的研究提供了新思路。

The notion that language can affect individuals’ decision-making has a long history in the interdisciplinary research of linguistics and economics(Campbell, 2003). While most existing studies discuss from the perspective of culture(Galor et al., 2016), there is some literature shifting focus to the linguistic relativity hypothesis(LRH), which posits that language systematically shapes the way in which its speakers understand the world and thus affects their thoughts and behaviors(Sapir, 1929;Whorf, 1956). Individuals obtain information related to decision-making based on how they classify things(Glynn and Navis, 2013). The structure of language plays an important role in the process not only by changing the classification but also by improving the accuracy of classification through repeated practice(Slobin, 2003). Future-tense reference(FTR), which is a typical characteristic of language, attracts the most attention since the introduction of LRH into economics(Kim et al., 2017). The FTR feature refers to how different languages express future events. For example, in the use of English, a speaker is forced to use will/be going to when describing future events(strong FTR), while Chinese Mandarin speakers are not(weak FTR). It is well documented that the FTR feature is related to not only individual decision-making(Chen, 2013) and macroeconomic development(Galor et al., 2016), but also the corporate behaviors(Chen et al., 2017).In this paper, we shed light on whether a company’s dividend policy is influenced by the FTR characteristics of language that shareholders speak. Gordon(1963) argued that investors’ demands for dividends depend on their trade-offs between current cash income and future investment return. The return on investment of retained profits is itself uncertain in both amount and timing. We predict that the FTR characteristics in shareholders’ language affect the distance and accuracy of their perception of returns’ timing, thus changing their demands on dividends and company’s dividend policy. Specifically, investors speaking weak-FTR language might consider the future earnings closer and more uncertain, so as to get a higher present value of future earnings and reduce their demand on dividends.Based on the sample of 33,414 companies from 30 countries(regions) from 1989 to 2017, our results show that companies operating under the circumstance of weak-FTR languages pay fewer cash dividends. The effect of FTR on the dividend policy is weaker but still exists after the cultural dimension of long-term orientation is controlled, suggesting that there is alternative explanation other than culture. To provide direct evidence of the cognitive effect, we test whether the impact of FTR on the dividend payout is weaker with higher educational level of shareholders and more institutional ownership. Furthermore, we adopt the setting of other countries(regions) issuing ADRs in the U.S. to show that the dividends increase along with the rise of proportion of shareholders speaking strong-FTR language. Before concluding, we predict and show that a higher uncertainty of return amount from retained earnings, induced by more R&D, more intangible assets and severer agency problem, would increase shareholders’ demand for dividends.This paper contributes to different strand of literature. First, we empirically test the cognitive effect of language. A large body of literature confirms that language affects individual decision-making, but mostly from the perspective of culture. In this paper, we use the idea that cognitive bias can be mitigated by better education and more institutional ownership, to empirically support the argument of FTR cognitive effect. Second, this paper provides direct evidence to support the influence of informal institutions on the dividend policy from the linguistic perspective. A stream of literature in recent years uses the cultural difference to explain the variation of dividend policies among different countries(regions)(Bae et al., 2012). We enrich the literature by showing that FTR, a salient characteristic of language, will affect shareholders’ cognition and thus the corporate dividend policy. Third, the existing literature studying the effect of FTR on corporate behaviors shows that firms operating in a weak-FTR language would have better social responsibility performance(Liang et al., 2018), hold more preventive cash(Chen et al., 2017) and invest more in R&D(Su et al., 2016). We contribute to the literature in this field by showing that FTR has a significant impact on the corporate dividend policy as well.