Personal Worldview Conviction Is a Missing Piece in Financial Well‐Being

ABSTRACT This paper introduces a novel and potentially essential financial well‐being variable—worldview conviction—for financial professionals, researchers, and policymakers to more accurately predict an individual's financial well‐being. Using the results from a sample of 492 participants, this paper finds evidence that having convictions about how life works (i.e., personal worldview) predicts financial well‐being indirectly through an individual's aspirational life goals (i.e., values). More specifically, evidence was found that higher levels of conviction in a personal worldview predicted more intrinsic values. Intrinsic value types (goals related to personal growth, deeper relationships, or community contribution) were found to be associated with higher financial well‐being, while extrinsic value types (goals related to acquiring wealth, fame, or image) were found to be associated with lower financial well‐being.