Sonali Patil, Jaya Saxena
As retail investors increasingly come into the stock market, there has been a growing demand to understand the psychological aspects that affect investment decisions. Of these, a tendency to herd, wherein traders follow what other traders are doing, is an important phenomenon. This study aims to investigate the effect of Social Influence, Psychological Behavioural Influence on Herding Behaviour in Retail Stock Market Investors in India. This study used quantitative, descriptive, and explanatory research design to collect primary data from 205 retail investors with a structured questionnaire. The instrument was reliable as measured by the Cronbach's Alpha (0.907). Data were analysed with descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis in IBM SPSS Statistics. Both Social Influence and Psychological Behavioural Influence have correlation with Herding Behaviour and statistically positive. Social Influence was found to be the superior predictor (? = 0.505, p < 0.001), and Psychological Behavioural Influence was the second strongest predictor (? = 0.463, p < 0.001). The regression model had a high level of explanatory power, with an R² value of 0.870 for Herding Behaviour. The study empirically addresses the theories of Behavioural Finance and Social Learning theory, as both external social interactions and internal psychological factors are found to have a significant effect on retail investors' investment behaviour. The study adds value to behavioural finance literature as it brings concrete evidence from the Indian context, and suggests application value for investors, financial advisors, brokerage firms, educational institutes as well as policy makers in encouraging rational investment decision making and minimizing irrational herd mentality in financial markets. Keywords: Herding Behaviour, Social Influence, Psychological Behavioural Influence, Behavioural Finance, Retail Investors, Indian Stock Market.