"Not Nearly as Bad": Social Comparisons and Responsibility in Debt Management

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 13
  In Roundtable Session: The Social Context of Education

Abstract

Research has focused on student debt as an individual phenomenon. Less is known about how the increased prevalence of student debt shapes borrowers’ conceptions of their own indebtedness. This paper draws on interviews with young adults with graduate student debt to ask how borrowers understand their debt in relation to others and explore the broader implications of these relational understandings. I employ social comparison theory to argue that young adult borrowers make sense of their financial standing in relation to others. Whether favorable or unfavorable, these comparisons maintain the role of personal responsibility in debt management. Attention to social comparisons may help to resolve tensions in the mixed consequences of the debt experience and inform debates on student loan forgiveness.

Author

• Ellen Bryer, The University of Pennsylvania