Social, economic and legal conditions largely determine people's financial situation. Nevertheless, financial education is an essential foundation that enables individuals to utilize their scope of action to achieve a self-determined financial life. The project was commissioned in the context of Austria's national financial education strategy. In addition to the entire population, this financial education strategy is explicitly targeted at financially vulnerable population groups. In this study, financial vulnerability is defined as the personal risk of an individual being unable to cope with a financial shock. The study focuses on two potentially vulnerable target groups: individuals at risk of poverty and individuals with a migration background.
The project aimed to identify target-group-specific and effective financial education measures for vulnerable groups and women and to elaborate on selected measures in more detail. The foundation for this process was to conduct a comprehensive behavioral analysis of the decision-making situations of the target groups. The study is based on a literature analysis and the collection and evaluation of empirical data (qualitative expert interviews and quantitative data collection using questionnaires; N = 3143 individuals). This approach allows the assessment of individual and group-specific preferences, barriers and motivators for financial education within individual population groups.