Does the level of social cultural beliefs affect the level of agreement of the respondents on the motivational dimensions of microinsurance?

Abstract

Insurance products and services in general are intended to transfer the risks brought about by both man-made and natural hazards from an individual or an entity to another. But since there is a misconception that insurance offered by commercial insurers are expensive and only for the moneyed consumers, or people need a lot of money to insure, insurance is only good for those who have big businesses or valuable properties. The poor and the vulnerable have relied on informal risk-mitigating measures like community-based insurance system or worst do not have any other means to help them cope and become risk-averse. This misconception has led to the conceptualization of microinsurance as an offshoot to microfinance primarily to offer insurance products and services that are affordable, the contractual obligations of both the insured and the insurer are nonlegalistic and lesser technical to make it more understandable to the intended market. This study aims to assess if social-cultural beliefs affect the level of agreement of the respondents on the motivational dimensions of microinsurance. A descriptive-correlational method was used in this research. A 40-item self-made questionnaire was subjected to validity and reliability tests before the same was distributed to six hundred respondents all over the Philippines. There were 422 retrieved questionnaires which 70% of the total number of questionnaires deployed. Conclusively, the results indicate that the level of agreement of the respondents on the motivational dimensions of microinsurance vary from one factor to another