Familial Responses to Financial Instability: The Financial Management Behaviors Scale, 2009 [United States]

This study focused on how financial difficulties may hinder or facilitate sound financial management. A survey of 1,000 adults aged 18 years and older from the general population was conducted by Knowledge Networks on behalf of the National Center for Family and Marriage Research. The survey was completed by 1,014 respondents out of 1,517 cases (66.8 percent response rate). Although financial behavior research is common in the literature, no financial behavior scale exists that is both multi-dimensional and psychometrically validated. Using data from a national sample, this study developed and examined the psychometric properties of a new scale of financial management behaviors. The Financial Behavior Scale (FBS) displayed adequate reliability (alpha = .81). Further, it was highly associated with other measures of financial behavior and discriminated between financial behaviors and time use behaviors. Finally, the scale was highly predictive of savings, consumer debt, and investments. Thus, the FBS appears to be a reliable and valid scale of financial behaviors.