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Research
CIFD’s primary research focus is on financial behavior of low-income households. It predominantly revolves around psychological as well as contextual factors and their impact on the poor’s ability to make and adhere to financial decisions. Its research activities are not based on the assumption that particularly less-well-off people reveal deviant economic conduct. Instead it is guided by the idea that especially poor people lack instruments and institutions that help many better-off people to better deal with various shortcomings and cognitive biases that are part of human nature. A better understanding of the drivers of human conduct and how they translate into practice is the key to developing financial instruments that meet the financing needs of poor people and thus make users better off. Given below, is the list of CIFD’s ongoing as well as completed research projects.
Ongoing - Research Projects
| Contract Enforcement in Rural India: Evidence from Irrigation Markets, Uttar Pradesh | |
Small businesses and entrepreneurs throughout India, from milk sellers in cities to farmers in villages, sometimes appear to “under-invest” in their businesses. This project explores one cause for this apparent under-investment—contract enforcement problems&mdas...( read more ) | |
| Why Rural Credit Markets Fail?, Karnataka | |
Formal institutions have limited information and experience with rural borrowers and thus refrain from entering these markets due to the perceived high risk. Experiences with formal institutions offering access to finance to this population also show low participation. However, rural borrowers co...( read more ) | |
| Click here to see the full list of CIFD’s ongoing research projects |