Assess a borrower’s creditworthiness by employing psychometric tests that provide quantitative measures of the borrower’s personality/character

This project intends to explore a novel way to assess a borrower’s creditworthiness by employing psychometric tests that provide quantitative measures of the borrower’s personality/character. A specific focus is on microfinance and developing countries.

Funds are requested to conduct a pilot study in BancABC (South Africa) that will involve pre-testing of a short psychometric scale administered to applicants for overdraft facilities.

The results of the pilot will be reported in a paper submitted to Journal of Development Studies (3* ABS) and form the basis for an application to the ESRC Standard Grant scheme.

The project is distinguished by a unique combination of expertise. The applicant (Dr Andreeva) has an in-depth knowledge of credit risk assessment in retail and small business sectors. The field work will be conducted by Dean Caire (part-time PhD student supervised by Dr Andreeva), who has an extensive expertise in microfinance, having worked for 15 years as a consultant to banks and microfinance institutions in developing markets. Dean’s second supervisor is Dr Wendy Johnson (Reader, School of Psychology, UoE) who has thoroughly researched structures of intelligence and personality.