CREDIT CARDS AS A DETERMINANT OF SOCIAL CAPITAL: A STUDY OF RATIONAL BEHAVIOUR OF URBANISED CONSUMERS

Abstract

This study intends to develop a theoretical framework to show credit card usage as a determinant of social capital of people who are living in urban societies in developing economies. Data were instrumented by a questionnaire. A survey of citizens of Kandy City area of Central Province of Sri Lanka was conducted to gather data for the study. Logistic regression, one-way ANOVA, and chi-square/Fisher exact tests were used to analysis data empirically to achieve research objectives. The results indicated that socio-economic & socio-demographic variable namely; life insurance, cash savings, and occupation status are significant determinants of credit card usage. Gender, age, education, race, and income of respondents are reported as insignificant factors to have credit cards.  Further, three out of four specific proxies of social capital namely; the degree of participation in societal activities, membership in credit association, and membership in the professional body have shown as significant determinants of credit card usage. Membership in credit societies has shown negative effect to have credit cards. In addition, membership in community welfare societies is recorded as insignificant factor to usage of credit cards. Accordingly, study results concluded that credit card usage of consumers of urban area in Sri Lanka is a good indicator of perceived social capital. This signals that promotional programme of credit cards by financial institutions among urban people could be implemented through social networks.