Skip to main content

Living Evidence Synthesis

Revision history

Psychological and Financial Harms

Approved public versions are listed newest first. Drafts, unsuccessful generation attempts, and versions not yet published through this Research Insight are excluded.

Approved public versions

  1. Version 67

    Automated claim-level support repair round 3, correcting 1 passage from synthesis version 66.

  2. Version 66

    Automated claim-level support repair round 2, correcting 1 passage from synthesis version 65.

  3. Version 65

    Automated claim-level support repair round 1, correcting 2 passages from synthesis version 64.

  4. Version 64

    Automated evidence-grounded revision attempt 2. Initial version.

    • Publications: 40 (-6)
    • Evidence statements: 194 (-14)
    • Cited sources: 40 (-6)

    Sources removed: An Anatomy of ‘Pig Butchering Scams’: Chinese Victims’ and Police Officers’ Perspectives; Epistolary Affect and Romance Scams: Letter from an Unknown Woman; Expectations vs reality: Responding to online fraud across the fraud justice network; Factors Influencing Involvement in Cyber-Frauds in West Africa and the Implications for Policy; and 2 more.

  5. Version 63

    Automated evidence-grounded revision attempt 1. Initial version covering the controlled topic. This synthesis reproduces the audited, protected passages verbatim where required and limits or removes assertions flagged by the independent audit that lacked explicit supporting evidence. All other claims are attached only to evidence records that directly support the material clauses.

    • Publications: 46 (-2)
    • Evidence statements: 208 (-15)
    • Cited sources: 46 (-2)

    Sources added: Epistolary Affect and Romance Scams: Letter from an Unknown Woman; Factors Influencing Involvement in Cyber-Frauds in West Africa and the Implications for Policy; Romance Scams: Romantic Imagery and Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation.

    Sources removed: Hook, line, and sinker: the mechanics of fraud; Meeting you was a fake: investigating the increase in romance fraud during COVID-19; Persuasive Schemes for Financial Exploitation in Online Romance Scam: An Anatomy on Sha Zhu Pan (杀猪盘) in China; The Trajectory of Romance Scams in the U.S; and 1 more.

  6. Version 62

    Initial version. No prior-version evidence changes to report.

    • Publications: 48 (+25)
    • Evidence statements: 223 (+84)
    • Cited sources: 48 (+25)

    Sources added: An Anatomy of ‘Pig Butchering Scams’: Chinese Victims’ and Police Officers’ Perspectives; A new type of victim? Profiling survivors of modern slavery in the online scam industry in Southeast Asia; A Study on Romance Scam : The Current Situation and Effective Countermeasures; Beyond Dollars: Unveiling the Deeper Layers of Online Romance Scams Introducing “Body Scam”; and 26 more.

    Sources removed: A Guide to Understanding Romance Fraud; Cyber Romance Scam Victimization Analysis using Routine Activity Theory Versus Apriori Algorithm; Emotional and financial costs of online dating scam: A phenomenological narrative of the experiences of victims of Nigerian romance fraudsters; How Do Crypto Flows Finance Slavery? The Economics of Pig Butchering; and 1 more.

  7. Version 61

    Automated claim-level support repair round 1, correcting 1 passage from synthesis version 60.

  8. Version 60

    Automated evidence-grounded revision attempt 2. Initial version.

    • Publications: 23 (-7)
    • Evidence statements: 139 (-30)
    • Cited sources: 23 (-7)

    Sources removed: A qualitative investigation of the emotional, physiological, financial, and legal consequences of online romance scams in the United States; Bi-Directional Exploitation of Human Trafficking Victims: Both Targets and Perpetrators in Cybercrime; More than Money: Examining the Potential Exposure of Romance Fraud Victims to Identity Crime; Romance Scam: Victim Manipulation and Human Trafficking; and 3 more.

  9. Version 59

    Automated evidence-grounded revision attempt 1. Initial version.

    • Publications: 30 (-2)
    • Evidence statements: 169 (-7)
    • Cited sources: 30 (-2)

    Sources removed: Scam Techniques in Pig Butchering Scams: Case Study; “Why did I fall for it?” Exploring internet fraud susceptibility in the pig butchering scam.

  10. Version 58

    Initial version: this synthesis compiles, weights, and integrates the supplied reviewed evidence on psychological, social, physical, and financial harms from romance and relationship-based online fraud. It organizes findings into seven focused sections and highlights where the evidence converges, where it is limited, and explicit research gaps identified in the reviewed literature. No prior-version evidence changes were reported.

    • Publications: 32 (+23)
    • Evidence statements: 176 (+123)
    • Cited sources: 32 (+23)

    Sources added: A Guide to Understanding Romance Fraud; Analysis of a Cryptocurrency Investment Scam: Pig Butchering; Analyzing the Evolving Modus Operandi of Romance Scams via Court Judgments: Crime Script and Policy Implications; A qualitative investigation of the emotional, physiological, financial, and legal consequences of online romance scams in the United States; and 21 more.

    Sources removed: A scoping review of online romance scams: Conceptual construction and comparative analysis; Mapping Computer Mediated Communication Theories and Persuasive Strategies in Analysing Online Dating Romance Scam.

Return to Psychological and Financial Harms