By Chrizaan Grobbelaar & Liezel Alsemgeest

Due to population ageing and a decline in the working-age population, retirees can no longer rely on government support in retirement, making financial literacy even more important for society to plan for retirement. The current low financial literacy levels globally are evident in the vast number of retirees retiring unprepared. Educating a society on the basics of financial literacy is not enough for them to make sense of pension rules, tax implications, or make complicated decisions in long-term retirement planning. Financial literacy education could benefit from a multidisciplinary approach. Gamification, when integrated into a multidisciplinary model of financial literacy education, along with educational infographics, and the use of visual learning resources, has proven to enhance knowledge acquisition, financial behaviour, engagement, and long-term financial learning. This study aims to examine the impact of two different disciplinary approaches to retirement financial literacy instruction, including a gamified educational tool and infographic-based visual communication, on retirement financial literacy. A randomised controlled experiment was designed to reliably determine the causal impact of each disciplinary approach on the basic financial literacy and financial retirement literacy levels of participants. Both interventions showed improvement in the participants’ knowledge, but in different ways. The gamified application was more effective in enhancing motivation, self-reflection, and behavioural awareness. The infographics were more effective in communicating complicated information and terminology. Combining multiple disciplinary approaches, such as finance, education, communication, psychology, and technology, in basic financial education and financial retirement education is essential to yield the best results.

Source SSRN