“Being angry and ending up getting a worse performance yourself isn’t really going to make you feel any better,” Mr Livingston said.

The Australian “love affair” with property is also attracting investors, with many believing that property is not a volatile investment, Mr Livingston added.

“In actual fact, that’s an incredibly undiversified and risky strategy. You really don’t need a whole lot to go wrong to end up with a very bad result.”

Mr Livingston claimed there is a “massive lack of engagement” generally between Australians and their superannuation, although he said that generally, SMSF members are “far more engaged than the average super fund member”.

“I think the dangerous area of SMSFs is those people who basically have been convinced by someone to move across... They sat down with a financial adviser or some other form of product salesman and had been convinced that the SMSF is the way to go,” he said.