EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Locus of control and saving: The role of saving motives

Alessandro Bucciol and Serena Trucchi

Journal of Economic Psychology, 2021, vol. 86, issue C

Abstract: Using data from a longitudinal survey representative of the Dutch population, we analyze the relationship between saving and locus of control, and we study the underlying mechanisms. Locus of control measures the extent to which individuals perceive their life outcomes to be determined by their own actions, as opposed to external factors. Those who believe to be in control of future outcomes turn out to save more, both at the extensive (decision to save) and intensive margins (amount saved). We investigate the mechanisms behind this relationship. We implement a mediation analysis to examine the role of saving motives, distinguishing between specific and non-specific purposes. The effect of external locus of control is direct, while the effect of internal locus of control is indirect, largely driven by (non-specific) saving motives.

Keywords: Locus of control; Saving; Saving motives; Mediation analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D14 D91 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487021000489
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:86:y:2021:i:c:s0167487021000489

DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2021.102413

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Economic Psychology is currently edited by G. Antonides and D. Read

More articles in Journal of Economic Psychology from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-23
Handle: RePEc:eee:joepsy:v:86:y:2021:i:c:s0167487021000489