Exploiting context-dependent preferences to protect borrowers

Linda Dezső (), Barna Bakó and Gabor Neszveda
Additional contact information
Linda Dezső: University of Vienna

Journal of Financial Services Marketing, 2022, vol. 27, issue 4, No 2, 305 pages

Abstract: Abstract Focusing bias is one of the key contributors to over-borrowing. It describes how people, when making choices, give disproportionate attention and weight to attributes in which their options differ more. In a loan decision, a consumer excessively focuses on the eye-catching difference between getting the loan and not getting it, while ignoring the smaller differences between making and not making repayments. Here, we show a simple trick that nudges the consumer to increase attention on the repayment dimension. In two experimental studies involving one hypothetical loan decision, we demonstrate that the salience of getting the loan can be decreased if one offered plan includes high initial installments. This steeply decreasing installment plan (i.e., with initially high installments that decrease over time) offered alongside the usual flat installments plan (i.e., with equally sized repayments through the whole term) increases consumers’ attention to making repayments, and consequently, they attend less to obtaining the loan. When the choice set includes the steeply decreasing plan, we observe a decreased preference for the flat installment plan and a shift toward not borrowing. Additionally, making repayments on the loan is perceived as a greater burden, and more attention is given to making repayments when the steep plan is present. Policy may combat harmful loan consumption by prescribing the presentation of loan offers such that at least one option includes high initial repayments, which increases attention on making repayments.

Keywords: Focusing illusion; Loan decisions; Consumer protection; Choice architecture; Loans; Defaulting; Mandatory disclosures (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D15 D18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41264-021-00124-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:pal:jofsma:v:27:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1057_s41264-021-00124-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.palgrave.com/gp/journal/41264

DOI: 10.1057/s41264-021-00124-x

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Financial Services Marketing is currently edited by Tina Harrison

More articles in Journal of Financial Services Marketing from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().