Include the Kids in Financial Literacy Talk

Parents play a larger role in young adults’ consumer behavior than the young adults admit. A major determinant of their interest in trying a new product category or unfamiliar brand is the degree to which the parents are innovative. Researchers at University of Western Ontario and University of South Carolina find that when a family group of shoppers includes young adults and their parents, the parents’ attitude toward innovation and risk carries more weight than the siblings’ views. The researchers advise that if you want to get the next generation to try new products, target their parents.
     Socialization from school, workplace, and the media influence consumer behavior. The extra kick from parental socialization of the children concerns genetics. Studies with identical and fraternal twins indicate that consumer behavior tendencies are passed on through the genes. When the kids watch or participate in their parents’ shopping excursions, nature and nurture work together to shape the knowledge, attitudes, and skills to function profitably in the marketplace.
     This importance of parental influence certainly applies to acceptance of new financial services products and to financial literacy, according to researchers at Iowa State University, Ohio State University, and University Putra Malaysia. Consequently, the researchers recommend that retailers of financial services products include offspring in presentations to clients and prospective clients.
     I’ll extend that to recommend all sorts of retailers include even younger offspring in financial literacy discussions. Because of children's roles as a future market, you've a responsibility to the wellbeing of your business and your community to cultivate kids into good consumers.
     Based on the findings of their studies, the researchers urge a special emphasis on building parental support for starting to invest at an early age and making investing a habit.
     Research findings from University of Southern California and University of Virginia suggest a framework for analyzing and guiding the parents’ socialization of their offspring’s investment and savings behavior: Attend to goal specificity and construal level.

• Goal specificity refers to how precise a savings goal is. “I want to save $3,000 this year” has high goal specificity. “Over the next few years, I want to save as much as possible” has low goal specificity. 
• Construal level refers to how much the consumer is thinking about why to save and how much about how to save. 

For long-range objectives, why and specifics are best. For the short-term, how and low specificity are best.

Click below for more: 
Enrich Clients’ Savings Deposits 
Identify Influencers in Family Decision Making 
Distribute Worksheets for Child Consumers