Fear, Greed and Stupidity

Fear can make you get in too late, sell too early, completely miss the next opportunity, get shaken out or not believe what you are seeing. Greed can make you stay in too long, add to a losing trade or not believe what you are seeing.
Add a little hoping and wishing into this recipe and you have a situation that describes a lot of peoples trading day.
The biggest losers play of all losers plays is to average down, that is to buy more when the price is dropping. They justify this by claiming their average price is now lower than it originally was. I have no problem buying if the price dropped but now it is rising again. But I never add to a losing position. Sure you may get lucky sometimes and it'll work out. But the probabilities are going against you. I'll sell or short it and then buy it back cheaper. When you buy going the opposite way all you are doing is tying up your money, preventing yourself from putting that money into a winning trade and setting events in motion that are heading for a double or triple loss.
A trader in this situation is having both fear and greed attacks. They are afraid to sell and take a huge loss and greedy because they are still seeing dollars signs by buying cheaper than they did before.
It is more logical to short sell stocks that are falling.
Traders should actually fear greed by reminding themselves that taking profit is an excellent way to keep your trading account growing.