The default option in individual decision making has proved to be a major attractor in a large number of situations, but we still have little information on the reasons why decision makers so often stick to the default choice. We have devised a new module for the Dutch DNB Household Survey to...

We analyze whether households' savings behaviour was affected by adverse experiences during the crisis and knowledge about banking supervision. Using a survey among Dutch households, we find that both factors have affected the allocation of savings. Individuals whose bank went bankrupt or...

The survey conducted in 2012–2013 by the State Audit Office of Hungary and its non-governmental partners examined the financial literacy, financial knowledge and risk appetite among higher education students (n=1,743), as well as the factors influencing the same. Our results show that starting...

Financial literacy, moving to the forefront on account of the economic crisis, is a crucial element of the proper functioning of any society. Our goal is to identify the indicators of financial literacy in topic-related Hungarian and international literature which can then be used to draw...

Financial literacy and the need to improve it are getting more attention as a result of the economic crisis. The effectiveness of the programmes that target the improvement of financial literacy depends on knowing what factors influence people’s financial knowledge. This is exactly the reason...

The intense innovational activity typical of the financial sector in the last 30 years requires households to have increasingly comprehensive and complex financial knowledge. The main objective of our study, therefore, was to assess and evaluate risk management activity, which is an integral...

We conduct a randomized field experiment to study the effects of two financial education interventions offered to small-scale retailers in Uganda. The treatments contrast "active learning" with "traditional lecturing" within standardized lesson-plans. We find that active learning has a positive...

We study the rapidly growing literature on the causal effects of financial education programs in a meta-analysis of 76 randomized experiments with a total sample size of over 160,000 individuals. The evidence shows that financial education programs have, on average, positive causal treatment...

In a meta-analysis of 126 impact evaluation studies, we find that financial education significantly impacts financial behavior and, to an even larger extent, financial literacy. These results also hold for the subsample of randomized experiments (RCTs). However, intervention impacts are highly...

We study an investment experiment with a representative sample of German households. Respondents invest in a safe asset and a risky asset whose return is tied to the German stock market. Experimental investments correlate with beliefs about stock market returns and exhibit desirable external...