A new study by Jessica Schulz, team coordinator of the FRIBIS Team UBI and Gender (UBIG), and her co-authors Ai Miyamoto and Matthias Nückles has been published in the International Journal of Educational Research. The paper shows that financial scarcity leads to reduced feelings of competence and relatedness as well as a diminished academic self-concept among students, while time scarcity particularly affects their sense of autonomy. We asked Jessica Schulz about the relevance of these research findings on ‘scarcity mindset’ for basic income research and whether there are plans to pursue this research further in the context of basic income studies:
Financial scarcity and time scarcity are closely related as they correlate significantly in our study. If students do not have enough money, for example because they do not receive support from the state, the support is not sufficient or their parents cannot support them, they have to work alongside their studies, which considerably limits their time for studying and also their time for regeneration and leisure. Furthermore, scarcity is a psychological concept that not only affects cognitive resources (as many studies show), which are absolutely essential for learning, but also – as we show in our study – motivational factors such as academic self-concept, self-efficacy, a sense of autonomy and competence, as well as a feeling of social inclusion, which are just as important for academic success as cognitive factors. Psychologically scarcity draws attention to the scarce resource, which leads to the neglection of other important factors. Students with financial scarcity, for example, describe how they are constantly thinking about whether they can really afford what they are spending and are constantly doing the math in the supermarket. Students with a lack of time are also constantly calculating in their heads what they can and must do and when, whereby regeneration, health and exercise are usually neglected. In a follow-up study (under review), in which we asked the same students about their attitudes towards the personal benefits of a basic income, we found a connection between financial and time scarcity and implicit attitudes towards an unconditional basic income. Students who experience scarcity were significantly more likely to describe how a basic income would relieve the mental stress caused by financial and time scarcity.
In addition, we found that female students were more affected by this relationship between scarcity and mental load than male students. In a follow-up study, we want to take a closer look at these gender differences under the term gender scarcity gap. The FRIBIS Gender Team is already discussing and reflecting on this topic.