There’s a very real psychological phenomenon called “learned helplessness,” and it’s not the same as playing a victim, it’s not a “poor me” attitude. I bring this up for advisors because I think it’s important for them to understand that if someone has internalized a belief of learned helplessness, if they don’t believe they have financial power in their life, they may have very good reasons for believing that.

Even if their situation has changed, they may need some help rewiring that belief. It’s not a character flaw, it’s not a personality failing. I think we look at people and think “Why don’t they just take the opportunities available to them?” If you have ever experienced being powerless, you know why.

We all can probably point to parts of our lives where we’ve tried and failed, and then when the situation changes we find we just don’t have the oomph to try again. And I think the concept of learned helplessness can help us understand that’s natural.  

Ellis: From your professional and personal point of view, does gender-lens investing reflect a change in the dynamics of wealth ownership in the U.S.?

Newcomb: I think that it’s part of the new financial narrative that we need to embrace moving forward. I believe that we need to change the narrative about what it means to be an investor. The old narrative is that capital is neutral and that you make your money wherever you can and then you give some back. I think that we collectively are growing beyond that.

We recognize that capital is not neutral, that every dollar that you invest moves the world economy one dollar in that direction. Being an investor has to do with what world are you invested in creating, and it stands to reason that the feeling of having a more positive effect on the world around you through financial choices hints at having power over your financial destiny.

Even so, I don’t think women know how much wealth we control, and women don’t know the numbers that show we’re just as good, if not better in certain circumstances, at making financial decisions. It’s like a learned helplessness, when you’ve been told for generations that you’re incapable of something. To then say that you are capable of it, or not incapable of it, not only requires personal ego strength, but it requires data. And the data shows that these stereotypes are faulty. But that doesn’t change what millennia have programmed into our unconscious minds.

Women, money and power is a topic that I have lots of thoughts about. Because I don’t think there’s enough research out there to be able to speak as a researcher on that topic, I am speaking as an individual.

Ellis: I’ve done several interviews in recent months with leading women advisors and executives in the financial services industry. Do you think women will expand their influence within the industry over the next decade?

Newcomb: I think it’s inevitable that women will become more involved in finance as women become more involved in their own careers. I work in narrative, and in understanding how the stories we tell affect our choices, and I think there are still some real cultural barriers to women embracing high earning, high achievement, and being comfortable wanting and pursuing wealth and power, for its own sake.