MINDFULNESS AND FINANCIAL BEHAVIOUR AMONG STUDENTS: THE ROLE OF FINANCIAL SELF-EFFICACY AND GENDER
MINDFULNESS AND FINANCIAL BEHAVIOUR AMONG STUDENTS: THE ROLE OF FINANCIAL SELF-EFFICACY AND GENDER

Summary/Abstract: Students’ financial behaviour is a factor influencing not only their academic success and psychological well-being but also their long-term socioeconomic stability, making it essential to understand the psychological mechanisms that shape responsible money management. Since formal financial knowledge alone does not automatically lead to better financial behaviour, financial education initiatives need to be enhanced. It is beneficial to incorporate components into interventions that purposefully strengthen not only practical skills but also psychological resources - namely, students' self-regulatory capacities and financial confidence. Mindfulness, which enhances awareness and self-regulation, together with financial self-efficacy, which reflects confidence in managing financial tasks, may jointly shape students’ financial behaviour. The aim of the study was to investigate whether the relationship between mindfulness and financial behaviour in college students is mediated by financial self-efficacy and whether this indirect effect differs by gender. The sample of the study was 708 students (594 females, 114 males) from the College of Business Administration (Latvia) enrolled in short-cycle higher professional education programmes. Quantitative data were collected through a survey encompassing scales for measuring financial behaviour (shortened OECD INFE Financial Behaviour measure), mindfulness (Cognitive and Affective Mindfulness Scale – Revised, by Feldman et al., 2006), and financial self-efficacy (Financial self-efficacy scale by Loke & Choi, 2015). Mediation analysis with 5,000 bootstrap samples revealed that financial self-efficacy statistically mediated the association between mindfulness and financial behaviour (B = 0.27, 95% CI [0.18, 0.38]), indicating partial mediation. Moderated mediation analysis showed no gender differences in the indirect effect of mindfulness on financial behaviour via financial self-efficacy (Index = −0.01, 95% CI [−0.27, 0.21]). There were no gender differences in measures of mindfulness, financial behaviour and financial self-efficacy. Findings highlight the potential importance of mindfulness and financial self-efficacy in promoting responsible financial behaviour among students of both genders, as well as the underlying pathways through which these factors may operate. The results suggest that interventions aiming to foster sustainable financial behaviour may benefit from incorporating components that strengthen self-regulatory capacities and financial confidence, highlighting the need for further research to deepen understanding of these relationships and their practical implications.

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