Financial Beliefs, Feelings, and Behaviors Tuition Task Force Tahira K. Hira Associate Vice-Provost for Extension Iowa State University February 21, 2002 Today I would like to share with you the results of a Survey I conducted of Iowa State Students in CCYY. I hope to share this information with you in hopes that we can get a better understanding on the students perceptions and feelings about their financial situation. Like Darin, I am also interested in the “investment in Higher Education”. This survey aimed at capturing the beliefs, feelings and behaviorsstudents have about their financial situation while they are going through college.

Survey Average Age = 22 51% Female 83% Never Married 89% White 61% Part-Time Jobs The summary statistics of those that returned their survey are shown here. Notice that there are 61 percent of the survey respondents that are working part-time. A small percentage is working full while there are attending school as well.

Credit Cards Here you see that credit card balances are higher for upper class students. The study also found that the number of credit cards held is higher for upper class students as well. Freshmen 1.2 Sophomore 1.9 Junior 2.8 Senior 3.3

Average Indebtedness This slide shows the average indebtedness of students by grade. Notice that each year nearly $4,000 is added to the average debt. In the sophomore year - more debt is added to credits cards, while in the Junior and Senior years, more debt is added to student loans. Recall from the presentation from Student Financial Aid - the student loans that are available to upper class students are higher than the loans that are available to freshmen.

Spending Behavior This graph shows that 48 percent of the students report that they buy things even when they don’t need them. This sort of un-necessary spending contributes to larger debt loads - either from student loans or from credit card balances that accrue interest changes that are often above 20 percent.

Spending Behavior Of those students that reported agreeing to the statement that they buy things even when they don’t need, a large share of them are women.

Spending Behavior Most of the students do not say their spending habits create chaos

Spending Behavior However, of those that strongly agree – the largest proportion are men.

Feelings about Finances Notice here that nearly half of the students that responded worry about their finances often or very often.

Feelings about Finances Notice that females are much more likely to be worried about their financial situation than males.

Satisfaction with Financial Situation

Satisfaction with Financial Situation

Students have control over Their Non-tuition spending Their Credit Card Balances (18% or more) Their Money Management Skills