The pension planning of Dutch self-employed workers: effects of Attitude and Personal Agency

A.N. van Bokkum

The pension planning of Dutch

self-employed workers: effects of

Attitude and Personal Agency

Abstract

Dutch solo self-employed workers have the responsibility to take care of their own pension funds through the private market, making them an exception in the Dutch pension system. However research shows that they often struggle to take care of this responsibility, causing them to be at risk of insufficient pension funds. In this paper I will study the pension planning behaviours of solo self-employed workers in the personal coaching industry through a qualitative research approach for thematic analysis. Using the Integrated Behavioral Model as put forward by Montaño & Kasprzyk (2015), I will use 2 key factors of this model to focus on: Attitude and Personal Agency, and explore how these factors influence the pension planning behavior of solo self-employed workers. Themes describing the results will be put forward and discussed to support a main conclusion that the participants save pension funds until they believe they have an adequate basic pension, after which a lack of perceived control and other effects inhibit them from engaging in further pension planning, some other

Statement of Originality

This document is written by Student Alva Noah van Bokkum who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document.

I declare that the text and the work presented in this document are original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it.

The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.

Table of contents 1. Introduction……….. 2 2. Theoretical Framework……….. 7 3. Methods……… 8 3.1 Participants……… 8 3.2 Methods………. 9 4. Results……… 10

4.1 Low trust in pension providers………. 11

4.2 Pension planning is unenjoyable, but very important to gain insight………. 13

4.3 Proper pension planning is reassuring………... 15

4.4 Preference for postponement and cutting expenses……… 16

4.5 Lack of skills or knowledge compensated by use of third parties……….. 18

4.6 Results conclusion………. 19

5. Discussion………. 22

6. Conclusion………. 25

7. References……… 29

1. Introduction

The Netherlands is known as a welfare state, through policies the Dutch government aims to provide (financial) support to its citizens. Among other areas, the Dutch government is also very involved in creating a well-functioning pension system. The pension system as created by the government provides every citizen with multiple different ways to build up pension funds, referred to as the first to the third pillars (Rijksoverheid, n.d., Pensioenportal, n.d., Pensioenadviseurs, n.d.). The ‘first pillar’ provides every Dutch citizen with a basic pension package, as set out in a law called the ‘algemene ouderdomswet’, or AOW. This provides every citizen with a set amount of pension each month, this amount is decreased for every year not spent in The Netherlands between 15 years old and retirement, though there are exceptions to this when a citizen moves abroad temporarily as a work deployment for example. The ‘second pillar’ is the pension workers build up while employed, a part of their wages are automatically put into their pension funds, employers are liable for a bigger part of this payment relative to the employee. The ‘third pillar’ is optional, there are a few choices for this pillar, citizens can sign an annuity contract with a bank or pension assurance company, paying set amounts of money each month in return for payouts after retirement. These annuity contracts can differ in means of value creation, for example through the use of saving or investment in for example the stock market or (crypto)currencies. And finally there is an unofficial ‘fourth pillar’, which is the least common. Citizens have a choice of numerous options to build up more pension funds through more abstract means, these include for example firm equity or homeownership. Though this is included by the government in the ‘third pillar’ as private pension, it contains different options of increasing pension funds. These provide Dutch citizens with the choice of numerous options through which they can secure enough retirement funds.

As has been shown, the Dutch government has ensured proper pension funds for their citizens through a pension system that automatically provides workers with at least two pillars of pension funds. However one group of the population is less fortunate, the solo self-employed workers. Since they do not work for an employer, they have no contract under which they build up the second pillar of their pension, thus leaving them to arrange their pensions through the private market, just one of the many added responsibilities that comes with being self-employed. The government places the responsibility on the self-employed to arrange an adequate pension for themselves. However research by Mastrogiacomo, Li & Dillingh (2015) shows that the majority of self-employed citizens are unable to match wage-earning citizens’ level of wealth and replacement rate, even during very positive

macroeconomic conditions which would increase for example the possibilities for saving, investment and return on homeownership among other things. Their findings show that the

30% below that of the current generation of elderly. In addition they find that business equity is generally low and thus unlikely to boost pension funds of self-employed workers.

This is concerning since in The Netherlands the solo self-employed workers make up 12% of the working population, this amount is increasing rapidly, as the amount of Dutch self-employed workers is growing the fastest in the European Union (CBS, 2019). It has been predicted that male self-employed workers can make up 19% of the working male population in 2030 (Bosch, Roelofs, van Vuuren, & Wilkens, 2012). This means that a large share of the working population is at serious risk of ending up with insufficient retirement funds. This can cause large problems for the Dutch economy. If a group this large are all in need of government aid that would be a huge expense, which in turn has to be funded by the citizens through taxes. This would result in a decrease in disposable income of all citizens, decreasing private expenses nationwide. A decrease in consumption means a decrease in revenues of businesses across the country, in turn forcing those business to reduce staff or expenses, worsening the economy further (Fuhrer, 1993).

As can be seen, the behaviour of the solo self-employed workers, namely planning and preparing financially for retirement, can bear significant risks to society if done

improperly. However previous research has focused on pension engagement among wage-earning workers, but since their pension activities differ greatly from those of the self-employed due to the great emphasis placed on the second pension pillar they are building with their employer, which automatically builds up as required by law, this research is of little relevance in explaining pension engagement among self-employed workers. To my

knowledge there is no research that has explored why the self-employed are at such high risk of failing to exhibit proper planning behaviour for their retirement. In this paper I aim to further understand what causes underlie this lack of pension planning among Dutch solo self-employed workers.

In order to identify the relevant causes that influence the behaviour of self-employed workers in regards to their pension planning, there will first be referred to the Integrated Behavioral Model as described by Montaño & Kasprzyk (2015). This model identifies the most important predictors of behaviour as established through a synthesis of previous research, making it a very comprehensive model for understanding behaviour. This model provides numerous predictors of behaviour, and I aim to apply some factors included in this model to identify the causes for the pension planning behaviour of Dutch self-employed workers. The factors set out in the Integrated Behavioral Model (IBM) should provide a solid basis for this research as it has undergone heavy testing in regards to healthcare decisions (Baranowski, Baranowski, Cullen, Nicklas & Thompson, 2003; Godin & Kok, 1996; Kassem, Lee, Modeste & Johnston, 2003; Vermeir & Verbeke, 2008). Just like pension planning, decisions in regards to one's health are relatively similar to pension planning decisions as

they both often include negative outcomes on the short-term but very important positive outcomes on the long-term. Failing to exhibit proper health or pension behaviours can both yield significant risk for the long term, yet both areas are vulnerable to neglect by individuals.

The IBM provides five direct influences on behaviour and three indirect influences. The direct influences are the knowledge and skills of the person who is to exhibit the behaviour, the salience of the behaviour, environmental constraints that influence the possibility to exhibit the behaviour, the habits of the person in regards to the behaviour and finally intention to perform the behaviour (or Behavioral Intention) (Montaño & Kasprzyk, 2015). These five factors have a direct influence on exhibited behaviour. Behavioral Intention is an important predictor of behaviour, but it can be supported or hindered by the other direct factors, although habit is very unlikely to be of importance when it comes to pensions as individuals only need to engage in pension planning occasionally. As a result of this pension planning behaviour does not get habitual due to its sporadic occurrence. Behavioral Intention is in turn made up of three indirect influences on behaviour, namely Attitude (the feelings towards the outcome and the behaviour), Perceived Norm (the opinions and behaviour of others) and Personal Agency (the ability to perform the behaviour and how it is influenced by outside factors). These three factors again are also divided into two distinctions, as can be seen in Figure 1.

Figure 1. The Integrated Behavioral Model (Montaño & Kasprzyk, 2015, page 77)

In this paper I will be focusing the research on the factors Attitude and Personal Agency of the Integrated Behavioral Model. Since pension planning is generally perceived as a tedious activity, the attitudes of the individuals are likely to pose an obstacle. This is

supported by Loewenstein, Weber, Hsee & Welch (2001) who state that when faced with a decision both emotional and rational responses determine the decision, in fact it is often so that the emotional response is a better predictor of the decision. A negative experiential attitude might cause subjects to not (yet) engage in pension planning because they feel it is a tedious task, despite them knowing it is important. Although Loewenstein et al. (2001) only explore the effects of attitude on decision making, Personal agency is another affective response that may very well have the same effect of influencing decision making sometimes more than the rational responses as is the case with attitude. Furthermore, the two factors might also have a strengthening effect on one another. As positive personal agency beliefs can positively influence attitude, and the reverse effect for negative personal agency beliefs. In addition to this, when it comes to the effect of personal agency, due to the difficulty of pension planning it is likely that some might not feel comfortable in their capability to effectively plan their pension. This is supported by much research on personal agency and motivation (Bandura, 1986; Cherian & Jacob, 2013; Rouse, 2001; Schunk, 1991, 1995), all stating that positive personal agency beliefs increase motivation and the reverse for negative personal agency beliefs. Ford (1992) even states that personal agency beliefs are more important in settings that are of large impact on goals or life contexts, pension planning has a large impact on the financial situation of an individual for a very long time after their

retirement, thus pension planning can be qualified as one of those settings in which personal agency could have a large effect, especially since it is a complicated task. This effect may be strengthened as personal agency beliefs can also influence attitude towards the same side. If an individual has very low self-efficacy beliefs, this can decrease the experiential attitude as this attitude is directed towards an activity they feel they lack the necessary skills and knowledge to perform. Thus a low self-efficacy belief can negatively affect experiential attitude, and the reverse can be said for positive self-efficacy beliefs. Furthermore, many pension arrangements are subject to the volatile condition of the economy, this can decrease the perceived control self-employed workers feel in regards to their pension

planning and this can also cause them to evaluate the activity less favorable. Because of this it is expected that attitude and personal agency are most likely to be of significant

importance in hindering the intention of solo self-employed workers to plan their pensions, thus the focus of this research will be on these two factors of the Integrated Behavioral Model.

This also means excluding the indirect factor Perceived Norm. Perceived Norm consists of the what the subjects think others want them to do (injunctive norm), and what they think others are doing themselves (descriptive norm) (Montaño & Kasprzyk, 2015). Perceived norms are likely less important when it comes to pension planning for two reasons. Firstly, pension planning is very individual due to many personal factors that

influence pension planning (employment of partner, family status, savings, employment history, personal preferences and many more) making it harder to establish a common norm. Secondly, pension planning is not done publicly, but both for injunctive and descriptive norms a sense of what others think or are doing is required. However individuals will likely only talk with a select few about their own and others’ pension planning, further decreasing the possibility of a set of pension norms perceived by the individual. This is even more prevalent as only 12% of the Dutch population is self-employed (CBS, 2019). As the

community of self-employed is thus dispersed across the country this decreases the strength of community ties decreasing clear perceived norms (Cho, 2006; Horne, 2004; Kandori, 1992). By excluding other factors of the IBM from this research and narrowing the focus on just attitude and personal agency, I hope to achieve a more in-depth view of these two important factors and how they influence pension planning behaviour.

Understanding how these factors affect the self-employed workers and their pension planning behaviour will further knowledge on pension planning behaviour (specifically in regards to self-employed workers), but also provides further testing of two of the factors included in the IBM. Further understanding of pension planning behaviours, especially by the groups who are at risk of neglecting their pensions (such as the self-employed) is important so that this information can then be used by the key players in the pension system: the government, banks and insurance companies, to provide better information and incentives with the goal of creating a better functioning pension system that decreases the financial risk to the self-employed and to society at large. This is even more relevant as so far no research has been done into the pension planning behaviour of the Dutch self-employed, contrary to the wage-earning workers. However research done on (pension) behaviour of wage-earning workers is not applicable to the self-employed due to many inherent differences, but it is especially the self-employed who are at higher risk of obtaining insufficient retirement funds. Eberhardt, Brüggen, Post & Hoet (2016) for example research the intention of wage-earning workers to search for current information on their pension status as for them pension

planning is done mostly automatically causing them to be uninformed on their current situation. However for the self-employed there is no pension saving being done unless they arrange for that themselves in the private market, this brings about a completely new set of challenges to the individual.

To be able to provide insight into the underlying beliefs, thoughts, opinions and experiences of these self-employed workers and how they affect their behaviour, I will be conducting qualitative research through interviews with Dutch solo self-employed workers. This is in line with the recommendations of Montaño & Kasprzyk (2015) who suggest the factors in the IBM be explored further through qualitative research that is able to identify how

first further explore the existing research on personal agency, attitude and their effects on behaviour, followed by the method through which these factors will be researched as laid out in chapter 3. Then in chapter 4 the themes discovered in the interview data will be

presented, then the findings will be further discussed and explained in chapter 5, finally the conclusions and implications of the results will be set out in chapter 6.

2. Theoretical Framework

In the theoretical framework I will be discussing the existing research on the Integrated Behavioral Model as created by Montaño & Kasprzyk (2015) and more specifically the aspects of the model relevant for this research. For this research two of these have been selected as discussed in the introduction, these are Personal Agency and Attitude.

The factor Personal Agency is divided into two seperate areas, Perceived Control and Self-Efficacy. Perceived Control describes how a subject evaluates in how far the behavioural outcome is determined by themselves and to what extent it is influenced by outside factors beyond their control (Manstead & Van Eekelen, 1998; Montaño & Kasprzyk, 2015). When faced with a task about which the subject feels that its outcome is only slightly influenced by their behaviour but severely influenced by outside factors, the subject may decide to not take action and instead leave the other factors to determine the outcome.

Self-efficacy Belief is closely related to this concept, Bandura (1986) covers in great detail the effects of self-efficacy beliefs in many situations. Self-efficacy beliefs are the belief of the individual if they have the self-efficacy to perform a certain behaviour. He describes that when a person believes in their self-efficacy, they are able to perform difficult tasks while enduring adversities. Even when a person is aware of the importance of performing a certain task, if they do not believe in their own capabilities to perform the task, they will much rather avoid the task or give up quickly. Examples of these in regards to pension planning can include the individual's perception of the influence of macro-economic, political or other conditions that may affect their pension in the future for perceived control, and their

perception of their own capabilities in regards to pension planning for self-efficacy. If these are perceived positively this is likely to increase Behavioral Intention, but if these are perceived negatively these are likely to decrease Behavioral Intention.

Attitude consists out of Experiential and Instrumental Attitude (Montaño & Kasprzyk, 2015). The distinction between the two is in regards to the object towards which the subjects’ attitude is directed. Instrumental Attitude is in regards to the feelings of the subject towards the outcomes of the behaviour. The subject has an emotional response towards the possible outcomes of (not) performing the behaviour, if the subject thinks the behaviour will result in very good and positive feelings, or not performing the behaviour will result in negative feelings, they are more inclined to perform the behaviour. The Experiential Attitude focuses

on the attitude towards the behaviour itself. It is concerned with the emotional response of an individual in regards to the idea and performance of a certain behaviour. If the subject evaluates the behaviour positively, they are more likely to engage in the behaviour. Likewise if performing the behaviour evokes very negative emotions and feelings they are less likely to exhibit the behaviour. So again the pension planning behaviour is influenced in two ways, first the feelings towards possible outcomes can impact the Behavioral Intention, second the feelings towards performing the behaviour can impact Behavioral Intention.

These factors are of importance in regards to pension planning behaviour because as Loewenstein et al. (2001) describe, when it comes to decision making individuals are influenced by rational and emotional cues. When these are conflicting they find that the emotional responses are often more accurate in predicting the exhibited behaviour. In this context this means that the emotional responses that self-employed workers face as a result of their attitudes and personal agency beliefs are likely to have a significant impact on their displayed pension planning behaviour. Thus in the research I will explore these factors and explore how they affect behaviour, decision making and possibly each other.

3. Method

Participants

The sample for this research consisted of 5 Dutch solo self-employed workers, all of whom are working in the personal coaching industry. The first participants were reached through my personal acquaintance, and further participants were contacted through the personal acquaintances of the previous participants. Table 1 below displays some background information on each participant. All participants with the exception of participant 4 gradually switched from a wage-earning job to being a self-employed worker in the coaching industry. Though the amount of time spent as full-time self-employed worker by the participants is not very high, their time spent working less at their wage-earning job also influences their total pension funds negatively.

All 5 participants are females, this makes them less representative for the entire group of Dutch self-employed workers. This is the result of the chosen personal coaching industry consisting of a lot of women. So the sample is credible to represent self-employed workers in the personal coaching industry, but less so for self-employed workers in general.

Table 1. General information on participants

Age Gender Family Self-employed career Education Participant 1 56 Female Married /

No kids

approx. 10 years total / 2 years full-time now

Youth Work / IT

Participant 2 57 Female Single / 1 child (25 years old)

10 years part-time / 1-2 years full-time

IT / Coaching Participant 3 58 Female Single / 2

children (24 and 25 years old) 2-3 years part-time / 4 years full-time Physiotherapy / Personal Coaching Participant 4 48 Female Relationship /

1 child (~10 years old)

approx. 4 years full-time

Arts / HR / Coaching Participant 5 41 Female Relationship /

2 children (2 years old and a step-child)

Some years part-time / 6 years full-time

Pedagogue

Methods

To properly understand how Attitude and Personal Agency affect Behavioral Intention and Behavior, I performed qualitative research to be able to capture the opinions, experiences and feelings of the subjects.

The qualitative research consists of conducting thematic analysis on the

semi-structured interviews conducted with the Dutch solo self-employed workers. After consent to record the interview was received, and the subjects were informed of the way their data would be handled and their rights to quit the interview at any time, the subjects were

interviewed. A semi-structured interview setting was used, making use of a set of questions that provided a guideline to the interview, the questions explore the general working

background of the participant, followed by exploring their pension planning behaviour and ending with the influence of personal agency and attitude on the pension planning behaviour the participant has exhibited. The questions are included in Appendix 1. After conducting all the interviews, the recordings were transcribed to prepare them for analysis. The

transcription aimed to provide a literal documentation of the interview, though little subtext was included. This is because the speech details of the subjects were not particularly relevant for the analysis as they added little value beyond their spoken answers.

After the interviews were transcribed thematic analysis could take place. The goal of this procedure is to find overarching themes within the personal experiences of the subjects, these themes form the shared essence between the subjects. Using a critical realistic

approach the goal is to capture the themes as explained by the interviewees, these shared themes can then be generalized and transferred to solo self-employed workers outside of the sample and industry. Thereby providing general knowledge and understanding of the feelings and actions of solo self-employed workers in regards to their pension planning.

This thematic analysis was done through first analytically reading through the

transcriptions to gain a basic understanding of the contents of the data, allowing to continue by coding the transcriptions, these initial codes were close to the interviewees statements and mainly summarized their responses. These initial codes were then used to deductively identify themes within the codes. The initial coding of the (anonymised) transcriptions can be found in Appendix 2. The themes were constructed with the use of the knowledge from the Integrated Behavioral Model and supporting literature to group the codes into appropriate areas of the literature. In an attempt to ensure the best quality possible, the data, codes and themes were subject to regular reviewing so that no important data or codes were missed and that the themes captured the data and literature in the best way possible. Through reviewing the themes their contents, definitions and naming was continually improved.

The final themes, consisting of numerous codes and supported by the statements of the interviewees together formed the results and aimed to show the influence of Personal Agency and Attitude on Behavior. Initially there was still room for patterns to be discovered that did not fit in with the existing literature but were still important to the analysis, however after initial coding the existing literature was used to create the themes deductively. Thus allowing for novel patterns to emerge during initial coding while still maintaining a deductive approach to the analysis. As I have no personal experience with pension planning this makes me as the researcher an objective outsider while the subjects provide me with first-hand reports of their pension planning process. Since I am not personally involved with such activities, there is no personal experience that would bias my analysis, allowing me to take on the role of naive outsider to the pension planning process.

4. Results

The process of identifying themes occured in a deductive fashion, comparing the data and codes gathered from the participants with each other and the existing literature discussed in the introduction and theoretical framework. During this process five themes appeared, these themes formed around the factors of interest identified from the literature. I will now explore each identified theme individually.

4.1, Low trust in pension providers

The first observed theme is in regards to the lack of trust the participants have towards the providers of pensions. The participants are uncertain about the future in many different areas. It is believed that in the future the economy might crash completely, the pension system may be entirely changed, or even the euro as a currency might become worthless. Some of these worries are described below.

“I even know, the retirement asset I have in cash on the bank, in a year it might not be worth anything” - Participant 3

“I also have little faith that everything is alright with that [pension fund], you see those pension funds, yeah I just don’t see much coming out of that in 10 years to be honest”

- Participant 2

“At the moment you get to work on it you feel it, at least I feel how much uncertainties are stuck to it, it’s false securities, it’s false security, it’s false certainty.” - Participant 3

Because there are so many potential issues that the participants feel are not within their control, they have little faith in positive future developments of their pension, government legislation and the economy as a whole. As their pension arrangements with the

government, pension assurance companies or banks are all vulnerable to changing circumstances, they do not trust the involved parties to provide them with a good pension outcome. This displayed lack of control over the circumstances causes a lack of trust that inhibits pension planning as the eventual financial yields during retirement of this pension planning are questioned. For three of the five participants this posed a barrier to them

engaging in pension planning. As a result of the perceived lack of control by the participants, they feel significant planning can yield them no benefits and attach little value to existing pension funds that are tied up in places they have little faith in (such as banks and pension funds).

All participants reported having limited faith and trust in future changes beyond their control to some degree, however some of this uncertainty and caution is warranted due to the fact that there is always some risk and limited control involved with the investments conducted by banks and pension funds for example. But for two of the five participants this lack of control and thus of trust formed the main barrier against engaging in (more) pension planning, this is shown below.

“In about 5, 6 years I will assess everything again, [ ] and that will be the moment that you can really say something about it, but there’s not much use in doing that now because

there are so many variables.” - Participant 3 “But I, I don’t save, of course not.” - Participant 2

The reason why participant 2 does not save is displayed next.

“I don’t trust that whole, uhh, I don’t trust that whole bunch. I don’t have a lot of faith in the financial industry.” - Participant 2

“[If the whole legal/economic environment changes] then it’s all a waste of my time and effort to know all about that. That’s how I think about that. That’s a little simplistic, but I can’t

influence it anyway.” - Participant 2

Of the three participants that found the lack of trust in pension providers to be a barrier to pension planning, only 1 has a single retirement asset with one of these parties, namely a bank account in which profits from the business get stored for retirement. Besides this and the funds from their wage-earning job which are tied up in a pension fund as required by law, they have no extra assets with a bank or pension assurance company. And even the faith in the pension funds as made available by the government for everyone (the AOW or ‘first pillar’) can be low.

On the opposite side there are two participants that believe that although some outside factors may negatively influence their pension, they still should use the means as made available to them by pension providers to increase the chances of them having a comfortable pension. This can be clearly seen as besides their wage-earning pensions, they use two savings account with a bank and stocks (participant 1) and have plans to make arrangements with a pension assurance company (participant 5). This shows that an increased sense of control over pension outcomes gives room to more faith in pension providers and results in more arrangements with such pension providers.

This effect is true for all participants, since most retirement assets are offered through governmental policies, banks and pension funds, of which especially the latter two invest heavily in for example the stock market, the trust in such pension providers can be very low. However some alternative retirement assets are much more trusted by the

participants. Primarily the selling or possibly collecting rent on a (second) house is the most prevalent option that the participants have at least some faith in. Pension engagement for such alternative measures is much higher even if they take more (continuous) effort from the participant. This increased sense of control and trust for other retirement assets is displayed

“I don’t think, ehh yeah that it [house] would lose half its worth, or something like that, I don’t believe that” - Participant 1

“Yeah yeah, imagine that [retirement funds] would be little, I can always put people in here for rent, or I can use my house in other ways. But it’s absolutely an asset for ehh, for my

pension” - Participant 3

“I have uhhm, a completely unconventional retirement asset, it’s eh, it’s not yet crypto[currency], but it’s eh, I have a license for uhh, for uhh (.) for the currency market, so I

deal weekly in the exchange of currencies, and that is going pretty well, it’s going pretty well.” - Participant 2

“That [pension asset] is then an apartment that I have, I have more faith in that, in those bricks I have a lot more faith than in ehh, in ehh, in pension funds.” - Participant 2

4.2, Pension planning is unenjoyable, but very important to gain insight

Although no participant stated that they enjoyed the activity of pension planning, all of the five participants reported that the insights they gain into their pension situation when engaging in pension planning is more important than their negative evaluation of the process. Thus pension planning is a necessary stage to achieve this goal. This can be clearly seen in the quotes below.

“So it’s not that I eh really enjoy it to be working on that, it’s more that I think ‘hey, it’s good that we have an overview of it [pension]’, that we approximately know how are we doing.”

- Participant 1

“[When working on pension planning] then I’m very constructive, because then I just, I see it as a chore, so then I’m very realistic, I’m not going to complain.” - Participant 2

Thus the participants have a negative attitude towards the activity of pension planning (experiential), as they dislike the process of working on it. However performing this pension planning or checking up on the current situation of previous pension planning efforts

provides both an affective and rational reward, the affective reward being a sense of

care of a necessary task. This forms a strong positive attitude towards the goals of the pension planning behaviour (instrumental). Further evidence of this can be seen below.

“I find that [pension planning] a tedious activity, but then I do want to know like what’s it-, what is it [pension] looking like right now, and do I maybe have something to take care of.”

- Participant 3

Researcher: “What do you expect at that time, when you’re done, what do you expect to feel?”

“Then I’m very satisfied. There! I took good care of myself, I did that very well, well invested in myself, good!” - Participant 2

This focus on the instrumental attitude (the outcomes) and not the experiential attitude (inconvenience of the activity) allows them to work through any grievances and engage in the pension planning. The emotional and rational rewards they gain from this strengthens this mindset for the future as they know in advance they will reap the positive benefits after the pension planning.

Just one participant showed less evidence that this process was present, however this participant has also barely engaged in actual pension planning. The activity was still perceived as unenjoyable despite having no real experience with it. But the positive experiences were much less prevalent compared to the other four participants, this can however be attributed to this participant also having no actual experience with the positive effects making it hard to estimate the size of these rewards. However even for this

participant thinking about pension planning was considered an important activity as can be seen below.

Researcher: How do you find it to think about your pension planning or to work on it?

“Well it is something of which I think I want to have it taken care of, but I also want to take care of it a little bit easily.” - Participant 5

There is even some indication that this participant too expects a negative experiential

attitude (“take care of it easily”) but still engaging in it due to the instrumental attitude (“I want to have it taken care of”).

4.3, Proper pension planning is reassuring

The goal of pension planning is to provide adequate funds for retirement, but in addition to this four of the five participants show that an affirmation that this goal will (to some degree) be reached is reassuring even in the present day. Thus the instrumental attitude is positive, in fact most of the reason to check and work on the pension planning is in pursuit of this short-term reassurance. The feeling that affairs are adequately sorted provides the

participants with a sense of security, calmness, reassurance and confidence. These feelings are displayed in the following quotes.

“What I experience then, some relief, that I think well in the worst case I should be able to work with that.” - Participant 4

“Is the image that I have of uhh my pension, is that right, or am I entirely wrong. So I do seek confirmation, like am I approximately correct.” - Participant 1

“This is nice, to have some sort of assurance that you ehh, that you just can get old in a comfortable way.” - Participant 1

“Of course it gives some peace if you know (.) that you don’t have to worry if you can’t make money anymore, that gives peace.” - Participant 2

“In some way I find it very nice that there’s something planned for me, so that I do know approximately like that’s about how it looks when I eh, retire. Ehm, so I’m glad that there’s

something.” - Participant 3

However this feeling only presents itself when there are pension funds built up that are deemed sufficient in a worst-case scenario by the participant. One participant did not have a bare minimum in pension funds saved up yet and thus did not experience this positive reward. Although this participant did imagine this effect would be present when the pension is sufficiently planned as seen below.

“Yeah I think that [ ] it would give some peace, that you think ‘well okay, this is taken care of. This is done, and eh, this is sorted out.” - Participant 5

The participants get motivated by their positive instrumental attitude to check and work on their pension planning to reach this feeling of reassurance. After some time progresses and

conditions change the four participants who already have some arrangements for their pension feel the need to check on the current situation of their pensions to reaffirm that their pension funds are deemed to be somewhat sufficient. When this is confirmed their sense of reassurance is refreshed, it then slowly diminishes again until they feel the need to reaffirm their pension status. The intervals between these pension planning activities are reported to be ranging from 1-5 years.

There is no evidence supporting a reverse effect; insufficient pension funds worry the subject. The single participant who did not have adequate pension funds felt little worry over this. This participant is also the youngest (41 years old) and is expecting to work on their pension planning soon. As a result of this, insufficient pension funds are inevitable since there has been no pension planning yet, making it a given but also easily resolved through starting the pension planning. There may be little worry about the insufficient pension funds as this problem has a clear solution that the participant is expecting to engage in soon, this may cause any worries about this problem to be absent as the participant expects the problem to be solved soon anyway. The reverse effect may still be present when the subject has already planned their pension but realises this is insufficient.

4.4, Preference for postponement and cutting expenses

Four of the five participants displayed a tendency to postpone pension planning to an undefined point later in time. The participants each named 1 or more of the following

reasons: pension planning is unenjoyable, they have other (work) priorities or they find there is no reason to engage in pension planning (yet) due to the uncertainty of pension planning. This postponement is not considered problematic by three of the four participants because they think that if pension funds turn out insufficient they will just fix that when they are retired. This solution was mentioned by three of the four participants that postponed their pension planning. Possibilities for compensating insufficient pension funds mentioned were working after retirement and cutting expenses. Especially cutting expenses as a tool to ensure enough pension funds as they would need less pension was mentioned by three of the four participants engaging in postponement of planning. Thus the attitude towards ending up with insufficient pension funds (instrumental attitude) becomes less negative, because there is an easy solution to the problem. Thus making the evaluation of an outcome in which they have insufficient pension funds less negative. No matter the reason for postponing, cutting expenses allows the participant to feel comfortable despite their risks, because if their pension turns out to be insufficient they will just cut expenses accordingly. This allows them

to delay worries about any problems with their pensions until after retirement as displayed in the quote below.

“Who lives then, who worries then” - Participants 3 and 4 (Dutch proverb, very similar to the

English proverb ‘Don’t cross that bridge until you come to it’)

The idea that cutting expenses is an easy tool to decrease the need for pension funds was portrayed by three participants, this is more clearly depicted in the following fragment of the interview with participant 3.

Participant 3: “So when I’m 67 and I don’t have a job anymore, if I don’t have any income anymore so this is it, this is what I have to spend, well then where in my current expenditures

can I cut, see that’s what you have to know. Pension is only interesting when you know how you live and how you want to live.’

Researcher: “But you don’t think like, if I do more now, if I do more now to increase that [pension] amount then I have to cut less later on?’

Participant 3: “Cut less?”

Researcher: “Yeah in your expenses.”

Participant 3: “Yeah I think that sometimes, yeah I think about that sometimes and I talk about it sometimes, but that’s very nontransparent, because of the stocks and stuff, so in

pension funds it’s just laying there, it’s tied up.

The first theme discussed the low trust in pension providers, this can be a major reason to postpone planning and compensate for any problems after retirement, rather than avoiding insufficient pension funds, because the participants have less faith in ordinary pension planning measures. Participant 3 is one of the participants that had little perceived control over their pension planning, and this can be seen too in the last part of the fragment above.

Interestingly is that the participants seem very willing to cut expenses. Although a reduction in expenses is bound to cause some discomfort. It is unclear from this data whether or not the participants accurately assess whether or not they can accept these discomforts, as they might underestimate the discomforts or overestimate their ability to deal with them. This possibility is strengthened as two of the participants cited the current global Covid-19 pandemic as evidence that they can handle a cut in expenses. Due to the

pandemic the government closed nearly all spaces such as bars, movie theaters or

restaurants, thus causing a decrease in the expenses of many households. However this is not necessarily comparable to a situation in which an individual or household must cut

expenses because they lack the pension funds to pay for these. This willingness to cut expenses and its relation to the current pandemic is displayed in the quotes below.

“You know, doing with less [expenses] is also not bad at all.” - Participant 4

“You notice now already in the corona-time [pandemic] you know, you can’t go anywhere, the things you used to do maybe much more, going out for dinner, to a bar, that’s now also

much less. So if it is necessary it’s not a problem.” - Participant 4

Participant 2: “I’m living as an elderly too a bit right now [during pandemic], because there’s nothing possible such as going out and things like that, and then you don’t spend anything

but that doesn’t make me unhappy, so I, yeah I (.)”

Researcher: “You’ll see what happens?”

Participant 2: “Yeah that! Yeah *laughs*, I’ll see what happens.”

4.5, Lack of skills or knowledge compensated by use of third parties One unexpected theme that was discovered in the data is the heavy presence of third parties in the pension decision-making and planning process, as this was named by all five participants. The readily available information or advice whenever things get too complicated allows the participants to make decisions without thorough understanding of the matters. It is generally accepted among the participants that very strong skills and knowledge in regards to pension planning is not easily achieved nor necessary. Thus the participants make use of third parties consistently whenever their knowledge, skills or motivation come up short. This acceptance of a lack of skills and using third parties to overcome it can be seen below.

“I find it difficult sometimes like what do you receive from that per month later when you get pension from that, and then you can’t really escape from using a party that is going to

calculate that for you.” - Participant 1

“I have no knowledge and skills myself, but I rely on the advisers that I have” - Participant 3

Researcher: “What do you do when you don’t understand such information as that?

Researcher: “What made you decide to arrange your pension?” [ ]

Participant 3: “That [bank account saving yearly profits for pension] was an advice from my tax-adviser.” - Participant 3

“I can imagine that that kind of things, it might be good to have someone [third party] who brings those to your attention. I think that signing it [annuity contract] I can do that myself,

but for the real deeper layers [I need a third party].” - Participant 5

As a result of this participants only engage in the activities they have the skills or knowledge for, or can easily obtain the skills or knowledge through their own research. But when matters get too complicated they make extensive use of third parties, as a result of this their own skills are much less important in the pension planning process than was initially

expected, making self-efficacy beliefs much less relevant to the pension planning process. However this only applies when there is trust in the judgement and advice of the adviser. One participant stated a lack of trust in the adviser as she had little faith in the independence of advisers as she expected them to all be secretly pushing their own agenda making their advice unreliable. But even that participant admitted to needing outside help when engaging in pension planning.

4.6, Results conclusion

The five discussed themes come together to form a single overarching concept, depicted below in Figure 2. As can be seen, all factors either positively or negatively impact the perceived benefits of (further) planning. Proper pension planning gives the participants a sense of reassurance, pension planning is unenjoyable but the insights it delivers makes it worth the effort and third parties are able to compensate for a lack of skill or knowledge, all increasing perceived benefits from planning. However a low trust in pension providers and a preference for postponement and cutting expenses negatively impact the perceived benefits from planning. It appears that the factors negatively impacting the perceived benefits

outweigh the positive factors since just one participant has arranged more pension funds for themselves than the bare minimum. Three have arranged enough pension funds for the bare minimum they could live with, and the last participant has not yet arranged enough pension funds. Using this information it can be said that the perceived benefits of (further) planning are generally perceived as low causing a low engagement in pension planning.

Figure 2, the identified themes and overarching concepts

The five identified themes not only directly influence the pension planning, some also interact with each other to amplify or mitigate their effects. I will now discuss the interaction of the themes to establish a final overall picture of the participants’ situation, and the

influences of attitude and personal agency on their thought and decision making process. An overview of the effects can be seen in Figure 3. The first interaction effect will now be

discussed.

The main observed effects are that participants require a certain sense of security, through any type of pension planning, be it homeownership or an employers pension or any other sufficient retirement asset, as described in the ‘Proper pension planning is reassuring’ theme. Once this minimum threshold is reached a sense of assurance sets in that they have pension savings required for survival. This causes the barriers for further pension investment to increase. Increasing the effects of the ‘low trust in pension providers’ theme and the ‘preference for postponement and cutting expenses’ theme. As a result of the increase in the effects of the low trust in pension providers, further pension planning does little to increase the sense of assurance, making it useless in the eyes of the participants to engage in further pension planning, as they perceive a very high chance of it yielding them nothing. This effect can be bypassed when alternative pension assets are used to increase the pension. The participants that used such means displayed a higher trust in such assets, decreasing the negative effect of low trust on further pension planning. However there is some evidence that this decreases the perceived benefits from existing pension funds in the form of assets they have less trust in (those assets managed by organizations such as banks or pension funds).

Causing a type of zero-sum situation in which an increase in alternative pension assets creates a perceived decrease of traditional pension assets.

When this stage is reached, participants show a clear preference for postponing further pension planning, because they feel it will yield them no results, they dislike the activity of pension planning or they feel they will resolve any issues with their pension when they are retired, or a combination of these. This is facilitated by the prevalent idea that if the pension turns out to be insufficient they will just cut expenses accordingly.

The process of pension planning is generally regarded mildly negative, however it is seen as a necessary task to achieve their goal, the two common goals are achieving an overview of their pension and checking the status to refresh the sense of reassurance discussed earlier. The stronger the sense of security obtained from proper pension planning (influenced by for example need for control), the stronger the positive effects obtained from working on pension planning, thus motivating an individual to engage in pension planning. This forms the second interaction between themes.

Figure 3, an overview of the (interaction) effects of the themes on pension planning

Having discussed the observed themes I will now display their relationship with the used literature to view them together with the areas of interest, namely the effects of Personal Agency, Attitude and their respective components on pension planning behaviour.

Perceived Control is generally low, this is related to the low trust in pension

providers. The participants have little perceived control over the investments done by banks and pension funds, the economy and governmental changes, thus decreasing their trust in these institutions.

Self-efficacy beliefs are low, however as described in the theme on the influence on third parties this is compensated by the participants’ use of third parties to assist with or take care of more difficult pension planning issues. Thus the low self-efficacy has little to no effects on pension planning behaviour as difficult tasks are outsourced.

Experiential attitude is somewhat negative, the participants all state they do not like pension planning, but it is also not regarded as a horrible experience. Although it does seem to have some negative effect on pension planning, both directly and through providing another reason to postpone pension planning, these effects are somewhat diminished by the instrumental attitude discussed next.

As described in the theme on pension planning being unenjoyable, the activity does provide the participants with a positive instrumental attitude in the form of both long-term security and short-term reassurance of this financial security. Especially the short-term effect helps to counteract the short-term negative effects from the experiential attitude as the participants are goal-oriented, focusing on the positive rewards at completion of the task. However there is another instrumental attitude at play, the participants’ idea that any problems that might arise due to insufficient pension planning will easily be resolved when they come up during retirement. This idea can cause the participant to give in to other negative evaluations they have towards pension planning as they perceive less necessity to engage in proper planning. This is described in the theme on the preference for

postponement and cutting expenses. This sums up the insights into the effects of personal agency and attitude on pension planning and how they relate to the themes discussed

earlier. The themes, their affiliated codes and the unused codes can be found in Appendix 3.

5. Discussion

The conclusions set out above provide an interesting insight, participants all required some basic pension on top of their government provided first pillar. However once this is achieved things change, further pension planning is dependent on numerous factors, perceived control, attitude towards planning, perceived benefits from planning and the availability of non-conventional options. Aside from these main effects some other factors were explored.

The findings of this research show that low perceived control leads to low pension engagement. This is supported by much research on perceived control that state that a low perceived control can cause an individual to feel discouraged and become more passive in their behaviours (Skinner, Zimmer-Gembeck, Connell, Eccles & Wellborn, 1998) and results in lower goal-achievement (Schifter & Ajzen, 1985). When faced with low perceived control the participants in this study either use alternatives for which perceived control is higher, bypassing the problem, or remain passive in their future actions in accordance with existing

indeed very low, it is normal that control is perceived accordingly (Wallston, Wallston, Smith & Dobbins (1987). In fact there has been research that in some cases disengagement can lead to increased well-being when facing extremely uncertain and unfavorable situations (Tomasik & Silbereisen, 2012). It can be argued that the participants who disengage due to an extreme lack of perceived control over pension outcomes (especially those who consider mainly the options offered by banks and pension funds) perceive a higher subjective well-being because of their disengagement to the matter. Faced with an environment they have no control over disengagement may lead them to avoid the worries that go alongside facing such an environment. However it is not completely clear that real disengagement has occurred with some participants, as they still consider their pensions at a consistent

frequency. However this can be an area of further research to assess disengagement from pension planning and its effects on well-being.

This study finds that the perceived benefits from working on pension planning are high to the participants, resulting in a strong positive instrumental attitude which outweighs the barriers caused by a negative experiential attitude. Previous research for example into intention to engage in physical exercise has found that the experiential attitude of the subject (exercising is unenjoyable and exhausting) outweighs the instrumental attitude (exercise is beneficial for your health) (Ajzen & Driver, 1992; Ajzen & Timko, 1986; Valois, Desharnais & Godin, 1988). However intense exercise is a much heavier activity than pension planning (especially when difficulties are outsourced to advisers). Previous research has found the salience of the punishing activity (exercise) is strong while the possible unclear future health benefits are much less salient (French et al., 2005; Lowe, Eves & Carroll, 2002; Sallis & Hovell, 1990). Since the activity of pension planning is deemed unenjoyable but not very much so, this negative attitude is much less salient. However the instrumental benefits of pension planning are quite clear and available immediately after completing the activity, making it much more salient. This is shown by the participants too as one of their sole motivators to check on their pension planning is to achieve a sense of reassurance that their pensions are in order (instrumental attitude) despite their negative experiential attitude. The findings of Netemeyer, Warmath, Fernandes & Lynch Jr (2018) are in accordance with this, they find that perceived financial well-being is a combination of two constructs: the money management stress of today and a sense of financial security for the future. As the

participants did not report that their money management stress for today had much influence on their pension planning, more focus can be given to their pension planning for the future. When future financial security is obtained then a sense of financial well-being is available, making it worth their effort.

Previous research has found that self-efficacy beliefs and performance satisfaction decrease when task-difficulty increases and conditions change (Steele-Johnson,

Beauregard, Hoover & Schmidt, 2000). Although pension planning is by itself a difficult and inconsistent task these effects were not observed here because any problems with the task can be outsourced to third parties. This allows self-employed workers to only engage in pension planning tasks that are within their capabilities and leave the other tasks to professionals. As a result of this any negative effects from task difficulty can be largely avoided. This clearly shows the importance of contextual factors on behaviour and experiences.

The findings that third parties allow even the participants unskilled at financial planning to prepare properly is in line with research done by Hung & Yoong (2013) who find that when a person actively solicits advice this improves their financial performance even if they report low financial ability. This is further supported by van der Rijt, Van den Bossche, van de Wiel, De Maeyer, Gijselaers & Segers (2013) who find that the perceived expertise, accessibility and trust towards the help provider increases help seeking and increases the positive evaluation of received help. However research has suggested that individuals do not seek advice even if it is needed and available (Lee, 1997) because they fear it makes them look incompetent. However the participants show that their lack of skills and knowledge is very much accepted as financial matters are not their strong suit, accepting that they need help in this area. Also opposed to the findings by Lee (1997) is research by Kramer (2016) who finds that individuals with higher self-assessed financial literacy seek advice less while individuals with a low self-assessed financial literacy seek more advice. This suggests that low self-efficacy (financial literacy in this case) can cause individuals to seek more advice. This is in line with the findings in this paper as the participants with low self-efficacy beliefs place a high emphasis on expert advice in their pension planning process.

A preference for postponement of further pension planning and of cutting costs rather than planning was observed. This is in line with previous research on choice deferral when facing difficult decisions. Research by Dhar (1997) has found that choice deferral is more common when the choice between numerous options is difficult. Since pension planning options have multiple points of difference this makes deferral of decisions more likely. There are numerous papers that explore the increase of deferral when there are numerous

attributes on which to evaluate the alternatives (Dhar, 1997; Payne, Bettman, and Johnson, 1992; Slovic, 1995). This may be part of the reason why participant 5 has continuously waited with finalising their pension planning despite already expecting to go with a certain option. However Dhar (1997) also states that sometimes choice deferral is appropriate when there are benefits to deferring the moment of choice. Some of the participants in this

research engaged in deferral because they expect their perceived control to increase, the closer in time the pension planning is to actual retirement.

The idea that expenses can easily be cut also contributes to deferral of decision making. The perceived costs of cutting expenses after retirement are low, decreasing the perceived benefits of pension planning and thus providing a rational reason to not (yet) engage in pension planning. However this would result in less expenses and thus less emotional benefits from expenditures, but this seems to be of little concern to the

participants, this may turn out to be wrong when necessity demands they cut expenditures in the future. This is in line with research on procrastination and the perceived importance of present and future costs as described by Akerlof (1991). He described that the salience of present day costs is much more severe than vague and distant future costs, thus causing people to be vulnerable to problematic procrastination due to the difference in assessment of present and future costs. This means that the participants may be vulnerable to future

problems if it turns out they underestimated the future costs of pension inactivity. This is supported by much research on salience and time preference (Fishburn & Rubinstein, 1982; Frederick, Loewenstein, & O'donoghue, 2002; Leland & Schneider, 2017).

6. Conclusion

I will now quickly revisit the findings and then discuss their implications for theory and future research.

The participants have little perceived control over the investments done by banks and pension funds, the economy and governmental changes. On top of this they also have little faith these will be beneficial in the future. Thus they do not trust in these institutions and their investments to provide them with pensions after retirement.

Self-efficacy beliefs are low, however as participants are aware of this and have very much accepted it, they are able to compensate this through the use of third parties to assist with or take care of more difficult pension planning issues. Thus the low self-efficacy has little on pension planning behaviour as difficult tasks are outsourced.

The experiential attitude of the participants towards the pension planning activity is somewhat negative, the participants all state they dislike pension planning, but it is also not regarded as a horrible activity. Although it does seem to have some negative effect on pension planning, both directly and through providing another reason to postpone pension planning, these effects are heavily diminished by the instrumental attitude discussed next. As described the participants find pension planning to be unenjoyable. However the activity does provide the participants with a positive instrumental attitude both through a feeling of long-term security but also a short-term reassurance of this financial security. Especially the short-term effect helps to counteract the negative evaluation of the pension planning activity itself, by providing a direct emotional reward upon competition allowing them to commit to the activity to achieve this goal.

There are some important limitations to this study which will now be discussed. First of all, the study was conducted with only women, this turned out to be unavoidable given the chosen personal coaching industry. However the participants, though all working in the personal coaching industry, come from varying backgrounds and employment histories. This supports that the sample provides a good representation of self-employed workers in the personal coaching industry. However since all participants are women from the personal coaching industry this imposes a limitation on the transferability of the findings to

self-employed workers in general. This is somewhat by design as this study aims to understand how certain factors affect the decision making of a group of self-employed workers that can be compared. Though less transferable to solo self-employed workers in general, the robustness of the findings is increased as the participants all come from the same industry, avoiding any outside influences that may affect the results. However the use of only women can also have an effect on the results. For example research by Hershey et al. (2002) has suggested that women are less engaged in retirement planning. Other research shows that women save less for retirement (Glass & Kilpatrick, 1998). Since this study does not have male participants to compare the responses of female participants with, the results can only be compared to other studies to check for the transferability. Glass & Kilpatrick (1998) state that women tend to take control of their finances only when they are forced into it by life events, this is comparable to some of the findings of this study that many of the participants state that they will worry about their finances when things go wrong and not before.

Furthermore Glass & Kilpatrick (1998) find that women are more likely to rely on advice of others instead of their own ideas. However this literature review was published some time ago meaning the results could be outdated compared to the current gender balances in society. More recent work states that the amount of time invested in thinking about

retirement for women has a much lower positive effect on retirement funds than is the case for men (Noone, Alpass & Stephens, 2010). This is in line with the participants in this research who show that they generally think a lot about their pensions, yet actual pension funds being accumulated are low. However they also find that many of the gaps between men and women are becoming smaller as women are becoming more and more involved with the workforce (Noone, Alpass & Stephens, 2010). Generally there are some differences between men and women when it comes to pension planning, some of the evidence of this can be seen in the findings, though this is less clear as there are no male participants for comparison. Therefore these are not solid conclusions, yet they are evidence that this paper’s findings are in line with existing literature on this topic.

Another limitation is all participants only being self-employed for a rather short period of time. However many did spend some time balancing both a wage-earning job and a

self-Despite this the usability of the sample for this research is still decreased as they have built up decent amounts of employer pension which makes their perspectives less transferable to self-employed workers who have spent much less time in normal employment and thus have much less, to no employers pension. However since most participants still reported having too little or barely enough pension funds, this sample can still provide valuable insights into what causes such pension deficits. On top of this it is not uncommon for solo self-employed workers to not be self-employed their entire lives, bringing the sample and the actual

population to study closer together as well.

This research furthers theory on several subjects, the most important of which is the pension behaviour of Dutch self-employed workers. However to a limited extent these findings can also be relevant for the theory on pension engagement and the influence of numerous factors on decision making. This research also provides additional evidence for the factors Attitude and Perceived Control of the Integrated Behavioral Model as described by Montaño & Kasprzyk (2015). However it was also found that context must be considered carefully when discussing the influences of certain factors on behaviour. This was found to be the case with self-efficacy beliefs for pension planning behaviour, any problems in that area can easily be circumvented through the use of a professional adviser. As a result of this self-efficacy has very little effect on behaviour, going against the consensus in previous research that low self-efficacy beliefs negatively impacts behaviour. Thus it must be considered that contextual differences can heavily alter how such factors are perceived in practice.

This paper gives light to numerous areas in which future research can provide further interesting insights. Similar research can be conducted to make these findings more robust and transferable by taking a larger sample that has more gender diversity and includes subjects from numerous industries. This can help to ensure the limitations of this research did not cause the findings to be not transferable to self-employed workers in general.

Furthermore new research can explore the effects of third parties on self-efficacy, decision making and decision evaluation. Some participants blindly follow their advisers’ judgement. However this can have effects on how decisions are evaluated and raises the question if they provide the same level of reassurance as decisions made based upon own knowledge. The effects of high self-efficacy and low self-efficacy when making decisions using advice from professionals can also provide interesting insights, for example individuals with high self-efficacy who make a decision partially using advice from a professional might feel much more confident and at peace with their decision than individuals in the same circumstances but with low self-efficacy. In addition to this the effects of gender on the way decisions are made (amount of third party help) and on decision evaluation may also be important. Previous research has consistently indicated that there are gender differences on