Bank accounts reveal the fingerprints of abusive financial control

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1:27Welcome back to the Nature Podcast. This week, how banking records can provide more insights into financial abuse. And an explanation to a curious change in the length of days. I'm Nick Petrich-Hell. And I'm Benjamin Thompson.

1:49Quick warning here. Our next story is going to be focusing on a form of domestic abuse, specifically one known as financial abuse. Financial abuse involves a person controlling someone else's money or finances, perhaps by rationing their access to cash or preventing them having access to their bank account. Other examples might include an abuser taking out debt in their partner's name without their consent or sabotaging their finances. Financial abuse can have long-term impacts on the person affected, with victim survivors being burdened with debts or damaged credit scores, for example, which can make achieving financial independence and stability tough.

2:32It's estimated that millions of people in the UK experience this form of abuse, with women being disproportionately affected. And yet, despite how widespread it is, it's been difficult to get information on how it affects people day to day. It could be really difficult to document and then evidence non-physical forms of abuse. So obviously, you know, physical abuse can leave broken bones and bruises, but financial abuse and emotional abuse is a lot harder to evidence. So we've had kind of small-scale surveys undertaken with victim-survivors as domestic abuse and then of course we do have larger surveys.

3:07The Crime Survey for England and Wales has looked to measure economic abuse and for example the Financial Life Survey which the Financial Conduct Authority conduct. But those sort of cross-sectional surveys really do only provide a snapshot of a victim-survivor's experience and also it is open to potential recall bias, particularly in the context of trauma. So, you know, there are limitations in terms of that self-reported data. This is Nicola Sharp-Jeffs from London Metropolitan University here in the UK. Nicola is part of a team that includes researchers at Lloyds Bank, a large retail bank here in the UK, and they've been looking to get a better understanding of financial abuse using a different type of evidence.

3:50In a paper out in Nature this week, they document how they used anonymised banking records to compare the financial activity of women in the UK who had disclosed to the bank that they'd experienced financial abuse with those that hadn't, to get more of a detailed fingerprint of what it looks like. They hope that this information could be used to identify indicators of financial abuse and inform interventions and strategies to support victim survivors. I chatted with Nicola about the work and she laid out a bit more about the data the team used. So Lloyds Banking Group has a specialist domestic and financial abuse team and over the years a number of customers have disclosed experiencing domestic abuse to the bank.

4:33So we had a sample of victims and survivors who had disclosed experiencing financial abuse and that was 5 ,428 customers. And you compared that then to a control group of bank records. What were you looking for? So we were able to compare the sample of customers who had disclosed abuse against a sample where there were no known disclosures, which represented over 15 ,000 customers who matched the demographic and socio-economic characteristics. And we were looking to see if there were any statistically significant differences in terms of their transactional and non-transactional behaviours. And let's talk about some of the key findings then Nicola what were some of the things that were different between the financial records of the women who were victim survivors and those from the control group?

5:22So overall we saw that victim survivors of financial abuse were basically more likely to lose their financial independence to experience economic instability and to suffer from financial distress so some of the key differences were the fact that they had depleting savings that they had increased debts that was culminating in missed payments, declining credit scores. We saw they were spending less money on self-care, so things like going to the dentist or the opticians or membership of sports clubs, for example. But they also incurred higher costs when it came to things like legal costs, unsurprisingly, as well.

5:58And they were also actually more likely over time to claim welfare benefits. And banking data then isn't necessarily just financial, transactional. There is also a behavioural aspect to it as well? I'm thinking of times that people log in or how they interact with online banking, for example. Yeah, absolutely. So we found that victim survivors, for example, were more likely to change their login details more regularly and to change their addresses more regularly as well. Certainly the login can be interpreted in two ways. So that might be the abuser taking control of someone's bank account and requesting login details so that they can then set their own details, which makes it difficult, impossible for the victim survivor to access their own bank account.

6:42Or it might be the victim survivor themselves trying to control that bank account, perhaps when they've left. And then things like regular changes of address again would reflect a separation. So victims and survivors perhaps fleeing from a household, perhaps going into temporary accommodation before finding secure and stable housing. How do these findings match up with other research in this area? Does it chime with what's been seen before in different surveys and what have you? Yeah, so I'm more a qualitative researcher and nothing particularly surprised me. So we know, for example, that 97 % of victim survivors of domestic abuse will experience economic abuse.

7:22And within that number, 57%, for example, will be coerced into debt. We know that victim survivors will experience interference with their employment. So seeing an increased number of customers have experienced financial abuse, having to move on to universal credit or disability allowance, again, wasn't particularly surprising. Seeing depleting savings where a victim survivor is then relying on the savings that they do have because they don't have their own independent financial income. All of those things are things that victims and survivors will describe on a daily basis. So it's hugely reassuring, I think, that we have this evidence base because it really helps us make the case in terms of policy and understanding the victim survivors' experiences more broadly.

8:07It must be said, though, Nicola, that this is a study involving UK women who have disclosed their financial abuse to a bank, who of course are in the banking system at all. How representative do you think the fingerprints that this work has identified, which you say chime with what other researchers said, how applicable do you think they would be more broadly? So we do right with caveats. We recognise that the control group, for example, might also include victims and survivors of financial abuse who haven't disclosed. So maybe some of those differences that we have observed would be altered if that were the case.

8:43so the sample is not necessarily representative but at the same time in addition to the control we compared victims and survivors against customers who are experiencing similar levels of financial distress more generally because presumably some of the things that you've seen in your data then could be seen in folk who are experiencing financial difficulties for another reason is it possible to tease out the differences between victim survivors of financial abuse and folk who are experiencing other sorts of financial difficulties? It was possible to kind of tease out the difference mostly related in relation to disability benefit.

9:22We know that victim spiders of domestic abuse, including financial abuse, are more likely to have health-related vulnerabilities because they're at increased risk. And we also saw a distinctive interaction pattern, and that was that they were more likely to rely on human banking channels, which might again indicate that part of experiencing domestic abuse is that you experience high levels of surveillance. So therefore, having that human interaction might reflect safety strategies that victim survivors use in relation to experiencing financial abuse. Of course, you say that the results that you found here do match up to some extent with what's been seen in other research.

9:59But this is, I suppose, an observational study. So I guess it's hard to say that any financial abuse was the cause of these financial outcomes. How do you need to take these results forward? Yeah, so one of the limitations of the study is that it doesn't allow us to establish causality, but at the same time, it really does give us some indicators that we should be looking at. So certainly at Lloyds Banking Group and other financial services firms, staff will be trained to recognise different vulnerabilities. So being aware of perhaps some of the indicators around financial abuse means that the customer can be referred to specialist support if that's something that they would like and at the very least that lets them know that support is available.

10:47So certainly in terms of experiencing domestic abuse a victim survivor might not be safe to disclose financial abuse or they might not feel safe or they might not feel ready but knowing that there is a specialist response is really important because we know sometimes that victims and survivors don't think that there's anything can be done because perhaps you know that's been the narrative of the perpetrator you know no one will believe you no one will be able to do anything for you so it's hugely important that customers are aware of the specialist services that banks provide both in relation to domestic abuse generally but vulnerability more broadly and your paper is out now how would you like to see this research used?

11:28Where would you like to see it go? I think the findings can really sort of guide our future efforts to develop vulnerability indicators and intervention strategies. I think there's also implications for policy discussions moving forward. So one of the differences that we've touched on is the difference in credit scores. So victims and survivors of financial abuse compared to the control not having such great credit scores and that can be a real challenge moving forward. We know a lot of victims and survivors can't get a mobile phone contract in their name, can't access credit. So certainly within the financial inclusion strategy, the UK government has talked about looking to find a way to reform sort of a credit rating system to support victims and survivors moving forward.

12:12So these findings could potentially act as a bit of a benchmark, potentially to restore credit ratings to what they would have been before having met the user. And then another really exciting area for me is that government for a number of years has provided estimates in terms of the cost of domestic abuse. So the most recent estimate is that it costs£66 billion and that is made up from things like physical and mental harm, lost productivity and increased use of healthcare but that doesn't factor in the socio-economic burden of experiencing financial abuse specifically. So hopefully this work again might inform sort of an extension of those national cost models to sort of better capture how much domestic abuse is costing not only the economy, but also individuals.

12:56Nicola Sharp-Jeff's there. To read her paper, look out for a link in the show notes, where you'll also find some links to a couple of organisations that can provide information and support about financial abuse. Coming up, how forces inside the Earth are causing subtle changes to the length of days. Right now, though, it's time for the Research Highlights with Dan Fox.

13:22Mercury, the smallest planet in the solar system, is shrinking. And its surface is getting wrinklier as it contracts. In fact, analysis of these features suggests that since the planet formed, its diameter has shrunk by around 23 kilometres. Since Mercury was born 4.5 billion years ago, its core has been losing heat, causing the planet to contract. This has produced surface ridges and cliffs called shortening structures. Researchers used satellite imagery and laser measurements to map the roughness of Mercury's surface. Rough terrain indicates areas where meteorites have hit the planet, disrupting the surface and kicking up debris.

14:10They found that rough terrain had fewer wrinkles, suggesting that impact debris has buried some signs of the planet's contraction. Taking these hidden wrinkles into account led the team to find that the contraction of Mercury had been underestimated by as much as 3.3 kilometres. If your interest in Mercury has expanded you can read the full paper in geophysical research letters.

14:44Researchers have identified a measure of cognitive resilience that could account for the differences in dementia risk seen in people with similar Alzheimer's pathology. Changes in the brain are strongly linked to the development of the dementia that characterises Alzheimer's disease. But these changes are not an infallible predictor of dementia. So, looking for other factors, researchers came up with a measure of cognitive resilience that they define as better-than-expected cognitive performance for a given level of Alzheimer's pathology. The team assessed the cognitive resilience of more than 3 ,000 adults over the age of 60 who had no symptoms of dementia.

15:28The authors found that this index predicted who would go on to develop Alzheimer's-associated dementia in the next 10 years, independent of pathology. A prediction that took into account both factors was more accurate than either measure alone. The researchers say that treatments that protect the brain's resilience could be as useful for staving off dementia as targeting pathology. You can read that research in Nature Medicine.

15:59Next up on the show, there is a subtle change to how long days are over the course of decades. These tiny fluctuations in day length have long interested researchers, who have thought that this is down to an exchange of momentum between the core, at the centre of the Earth, and the mantle, the layer of rock between the crust and the core. But the exact mechanism of how this works has been elusive. New research in nature, though, may change that, and it could tell us something more about the deep interior of the Earth. Joining me to talk Earth sciences is nature reporter James Deneen, who's been writing all about this new paper.

16:37James, hi, how's it going? Hi, it's great to be here. I love talking about the deep earth. So excited to discuss this with you. Well, before we get to the deep earth, I'm curious about the earth that we live on, on the surface. I've never noticed that there's a change in day length. What sort of scale of change are we talking about here? So the length of earth's day is determined by earth's rate of rotation. And there are extremely subtle, small changes in the length of day, year to year, decade to decade, centuries to centuries. And there are different factors that affect that, but they're really small.

17:13That's why we don't notice them. These are on the order of a few milliseconds every few years. And this is not a new observation. Researchers have known about this for a long time. So what's been their sort of general idea of how this might be working? On these decade-to-decade changes in the length of day, there had already been earlier work that showed that they could be explained pretty well if you think about how the momentum from flows in the core is transferred to the mantle. What was unclear is which forces were contributing to this effect and how they were interacting exactly. And so there are sort of three key forces at play here.

17:55They include what's called gravitational torque, where regions with different densities in the lower mantle and the inner core, which is the solid moon-sized ball at the center of Earth, can pull at each other via gravity. Then there's also an electromagnetic torque where the magnetic field generated by the fluid motion of the outer core pulls at the mantle. And then there's what's called a topographic torque where flow in the outer core actually pushes and pulls on bumps and bulges at the core mantle boundary. So all three of those forces were at play in some way, but the deep earth is an inaccessible place and there's a huge amount of uncertainty in the parameters that define how these three forces are interacting to change Earth's overall rotation.

18:50As you say, the deep earth is very inaccessible. So in this new research, what did they do to try and figure out how these forces were playing against each other? So like geophysicists love to do, they created a model. They created a model of how all of these forces interact based on a bunch of different geophysical observations about Earth's interior. And maybe the most important of these came from using seismic waves generated by earthquakes to measure the rate at which the inner core is spinning relative to the rest of the planet. The inner core, it's been known for a few decades, spins at a slightly faster or sometimes slower rate than the rest of the planet.

19:35And that offers another constraint on this angular momentum transferred from core to mantle. So they use this seismic reconstruction of the rotation rate of the inner core since the 1960s as this foundation for their model. And then they changed a bunch of knobs, turned a bunch of knobs on all these factors describing Earth's interior to see which model best matched the detailed record of changes in the length of day since the 1960s. And what they found is that the model that could best explain changes in the length of day over the past several decades involves this battle between the gravitational torque between core and mantle and the electromagnetic and topographic torque.

20:25And were they surprised at this or was this sort of what they were expecting? Yeah, I think they didn't know what they were going to find. They explained it this way to me, this battle between gravitational forces, magnetic and topographic forces. In essence, the inner core wants to be aligned with the gravity of the mantle. It likes being in this particular position, but it gets pulled out of alignment by the magnetic flows of the outer core. And then once it's out of alignment with the gravity of the mantle, it has to be pulled back into position. And that push and pull on the inner core in their model affects Earth's overall rotation in a way that matches really well with this extremely precise record of changes in the length of day.

21:10And, you know, it's obviously cool to know that this is the reason behind why this change in day happens. But is there something more broad that we could learn from this study? Absolutely. It's totally amazing to think about the fact that our lives on the surface, when we look up at the sunset and when it happens, there's a small influence on that from the centre of Earth. But one exciting aspect of this study, the fact that their model matches so well with this record of length of day could mean that other details of their model of the deep earth are also on the right track. So they're not just reconstructing the rotation of the inner core, for instance, they're reconstructing aspects of density in the lower mantle, which is what controls its gravitational field.

21:58And they're also reconstructing things like the amount of iron in the bottom part of the lower mantle, which is connected to how these magnetic forces connect mantle and core. And there are a bunch of different aspects that you could pull out. But one interesting one, I think, so in their model that best matches changes in the length of day, they find that there are these two huge structures on either side of the core that are called large, low-velocity provinces. And for a long time, seismologists have debated why they're there, what they're made of, are they denser or just hotter than the rest of the mantle?

22:37And this model from length of day suggests that these two structures are sort of almost neutrally buoyant in the mantle, which means they're denser than the average mantle, but they're also hotter. And so they just sit there on the bottom of the mantle against the core. And that's one aspect that's pretty interesting. But, you know, there's one thing that we never tire of saying on the Nature podcast, and that's more research needs to be done. So what are the sort of next steps for this? What else do they need to do to better understand this particular thing? Well, one of the most important aspects of their model they explained to me is this estimate of the rate of Earth's inner core rotation.

23:19and that comes from seismology and there's still some debate among seismologists about how to interpret their observations of the spinning inner core and so more confidence there will feed back into a model like this and give even more confidence that the geophysicists are on the right track to making sense of the earth's interior and speaking of geophysicists of scientists what did they make of this study the researchers you spoke to outside of the study itself. I spoke with one researcher who said that he thought this model looked very reasonable and it's good to see that there is this alignment of things like the results from seismology describing the rotation of the inner core and this measurement of length of day, seeing that they match up is exciting.

24:04But they also say that there's other aspects that the model doesn't include. For instance, Earth's rate of rotation can also be affected by things in the oceans and atmosphere on the surface, but the model doesn't account for those sorts of things. So I'm sure there'll be more models, more research in the future then. Absolutely. Always more models, more research. But one thing that's really striking, I've been paying really close attention to the research on the deep earth for a while. And something exciting about this is it seems to integrate a lot of different ideas from different fields in one place and connect it to this single measurement of changes in earth rotation.

24:45There's something beautiful about that. Thank you so much, James, for joining me. Thanks for having me. That was Nature reporter James Dineen. To read his story, check out the show notes for some links. And that's all for this time. If you'd like to stay in touch with us, you can. We're on email, podcast at nature.com, or you can find us on social media, at Nature Podcast. I'm Benjamin Thompson. And I'm Nick Pertscher-Chow. Thanks for listening.

25:37luxury. It's a foundation. AT &T Business is built to work so you can spend less time troubleshooting and more time focusing on what actually matters. Powered by AT &T Business, built to work. Get today at business.att.com. There are two types of business owners, those who are busy and those who want to be busy. Toast is designed for both, with tools to keep you humming and help turn grind into growth. That's how you turn busy into business. Toast. Built for busy.