This paper explores the understanding that the average retail investor has for risk and volatility. We discuss recent developments in retail trading such as the rise of online brokers and the ever-increasing presence of social media. We also discuss the impact that psychological factors such as market sentiment, herd mentality and FOMO may have on the individual when making investment decisions. The argument is made that most market makers such as online brokers fail to fulfill their fiduciary responsibility by allowing inexperienced retail investors to trade with highly complex leveraged financial instruments with minimal knowledge tests. As such the paper sets out to answer two primary questions. Is there a disparity in the average retail investors risk aversion and actions (especially amongst younger people) and to which degree is this issue magnified by leverage. Has the short-term market volatility increased because of higher stock market participation by retail investors? The methodology to answer these questions consist of a survey and a market analysis. The survey consists of 28 questions designed to both measure the respondents risk aversion and their willingness to spend/invest. A disparity between an individual's risk aversion and willingness to spend/invest could indicate a lacking understanding regarding risk and volatility. The market analysis consists of the ten most popular stocks for individuals under 30 on Avanza. With this dataset we examine the relationship between change in the number of owners, volatility and returns for all ten companies. Both the survey and market analysis yield conflicting and at times difficult to interpret results. As such we fail to make any significant statements regarding our questions. There are however other studies with larger sample sizes that succeed in estimating both risk aversion and its correlation with age, such as Yao et al (2016) and Grable et al (2020). Regardless of our failure to empirically prove a disparity in the understanding of the average retail investor we build our arguments upon behavioral and psychological finance and maintain the stance that online brokers need to do more to sufficiently fulfill their fiduciary responsibilities.