Blog

 What makes people unhappy with their credit cards?  Surprisingly, it’s not the interest charges.  This paper finds that what causes people stress and dissatisfaction with their credit cards has to do with how they use the cards more than how much the cards actually wind up costing.  Being late on...

July 03, 2019

 This study develops a general method for evaluating changes in response relating to students’ perceptions of personal finance and financial products using data from a sample of 1,250 students aged 16-18 who participated in a financial capability education study in the UK. We find significant changes in the responses of...

June 26, 2019

 In Volume 30 (1) of the Journal of Financial Counseling and Planning (JFCP), Hoa Thi Nguyen’s paper presents the development and validation of a Financial Self-Efficacy Scale that was tested with women in the United States. The Women's Financial Self-Efficacy Scale (WFSES) showed good evidence of reliability and validity. Its...

June 19, 2019

Being unbanked makes it difficult for low and moderate-income (LMI) households to manage finances, save, and access credit. In this study, we assessed effects of an online tax-time savings intervention on savings account openings in the 6 months following tax filing among a sample of 4,692 LMI tax filers. New research...

May 15, 2019

Research brief contributed by Keith MorelandExciting Findings:The most exciting findings of my paper1 are that obtaining financial advice is associated with improved (more productive) financial behaviors, such as avoiding bank overdrafts, paying credit card balances on time and in full, establishing a retirement account, and checking credit scores/reports. Further, this association is...

March 27, 2019

Research is not about numbers but rather, telling a story. In family economics it often is about the relationship of household characteristics such as income and education, to investment decisions, retirement adequacy, and general household well being. A frequently used source of data is the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) conducted by...

March 20, 2019

Perceived Economic Mobility, Income, and Financial Behaviors of Young AdultsResearch brief contributed by Julie SzendreyThis study is one of the first to investigate the relationships between perceived economic mobility (Yoon & Wong, 2014) of young adults and their financial management behaviors, specifically cash management, credit management, and savings and investment (Dew &...

March 13, 2019

Though there is much attention paid to overcrowded prisons, criminal justice reform, and recidivism, little has been done to address how men and women who have experienced incarceration relate to money. There is so much not known that it’s difficult to know where to start the conversation. In my recent...

January 09, 2019

The Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education® (AFCPE®) recently released results from a study examining the association of health and financial resources with stress. Published in the Journal of Financial Counseling and Planning (JFCP) as part of the special issue on health and finances, the study revealed that perceived accumulation and loss...

September 19, 2018

The rising costs of health care and/or lack of insurance coverage may cause many households to build up medical bills to the point where they cannot pay them. A recent research study of bankruptcy filings found significant medical debt serves as a trigger, rather than a fundamental cause, of bankruptcy....

September 05, 2018

I have a confession to make: I hate cash. And beyond that, I do not practice many of the behaviors I have heard preached from financial pulpits over the past several years. For example, I do not keep 3-6 months of living expenses in cash or equivalents. This paper began...

August 22, 2018