Conference Program

The need to develop personal finance literacy is an increasingly important issue worldwide, especially in the wake of the latest financial shocks and geopolitical crises. The large majority of households do not possess the basic knowledge of financial concepts necessary to effectively manage their personal finances and achieve a lifetime of financial well-being. Financial literacy thus represents an essential life skill being able to reduce inequalities and to improve social justice.

Despite the very large number of financial education initiatives promoted over the years both domestically and internationally, unfortunately recent evidence confirms the individuals' poor ability to manage their money, although some positive signs have emerged compared to the past. Considering the investments made to date and the attention given to the topic by governments and financial authorities worldwide, we would have expected a much greater growth in the households' skills.

The proposal aims to understand how to enhance the effectiveness of future financial education initiatives, which currently rely primarily on traditional learning methods, such as seminars. However, financial literacy is more than just understanding theoretical concepts and making practical decisions based on numbers and data. Personal finance, unlike other disciplines, requires not only technical knowledge, but also the ability to manage one's emotions, which often negatively impact on individuals' decision-making processes. In addition to that, in this domain it is unlikely that individuals have the chance to make the same decision several times; it is more common that a choice is made only once (or very few times) during the lifetime of the person, but that decision may produce its effects for one or two decades, or even more. A typical example is when an individual wants to buy a house and ask for a mortgage: signing a wrong contract lead that person to pay higher fees and interests over several years.

For all of the above reasons, the methodologies used so far to teach the basics of personal finance to the general public may not be the most appropriate. Game-based learning instead, and more precisely board game-based learning, might be an effective alternative approach leading to a stronger increase in financial literacy worldwide. It has been proved in literature that this form of experiential learning through games encourages critical thinking, calculated risk-taking, and the exploration of unusual alternatives by providing an interactive and low-stakes environment for active participation. Playing games also develops participants’ engagement, which is very useful to transfer knowledge, especially in domains that individuals perceive not to be very attractive and quite boring, like personal finance is thought to be.

If properly used, games could represent a valuable tool for transferring basic financial skills to individuals, and thus to enhance households’ financial literacy, not only in Italy, but also worldwide.