The scenario of youth facing financial difficulty in Malaysia is arising uproar. This
can be seen through the bankruptcy rate that has recorded by Malaysia Department of
Insolvency that proven youth as early 30s has been declared bankrupt (MDI). This
statistic is worrying as the higher the number of bankruptcy that comes from youth
category, it shows that youth in Malaysia possessed low financial literacy and has less
savings practices. Moreover, with the high rate of youth bankruptcy, it disrupt the
flow of country’s economic cycle as youth is the biggest purchasing power in the
economy. Youth are being exposed to the external factors that drive them to make
unnecessary spending and even spend beyond their capabilities. This lead to youth
borrowing and caused high accumulation of debt which lastly my resolve with
bankruptcy declaration that consists of numerous negative side-effect. Hence, this
study aim to investigate the relationship between the social factors and the scenario of
financial constraint among youth. This study has tested three (3) independent variable:
youth lifestyle, social media exposure and purchasing trend and (1) moderating
variable: gender in order to determine their influence towards scenario of financial
constraint among youth. This study are conducted in areas located within Petaling
District: Bandar Petaling Jaya, Bukit Raja, Damansara, Petaling and Sungai Buloh has
involved 441 respondents from this place. The survey has been done through
Whatsapp, SMS and social media platforms. This study employs a quantitative
method of analysis that involves Pearson Correlation. PROCESS analysis and
multiple regression analysis by using SPSS software. The finding of this study
revealed that the independent variable youth lifestyle (p=0.031) and social media
exposure (p=0.000) appear to have a significant relationship with the scenario of
youth financial constraint. However, independent variable purchasing trends appear as
no significant relationship with the scenario of youth financial constraint (p=0.181).
For moderating variable, results show that gender does not influence the relationship
between social factors and youth financial constraint (P>0.05). Lastly, multiple
regression analysis shows that social media exposure was recorded as the most
influential factor associate with scenario of youth financial constraint (Social Media
Exposure, β = -0.189). This study provided some insights and awareness for
government or policymaker, concerned authority, parents or guardian and youth
community on how to ensure youth could be prevented from falling into financial
difficulty.
