Integrating Construal-level Theory in Designing Fear Appeals in IS Security Research

Organizations increasingly use fear appeals to motivate users to engage in behaviors that protect information security. Though academic interest in the topic has burgeoned, prior research has mainly focused on providing process evidence on how low- and high-threat security messages influence protective behaviors. According to protection motivation theory, however, the threat-appraisal phase, in which the receiver evaluates whether a fear appeal is threatening or not, follows exposure to the fear appeal. One can indeed design fear appeals to manipulate different dimensions, including the threat depicted and the coping response provided. These dimensions, in turn, influence protection motivation. The general focus on low- and high-threat messages runs the risks of 1) foregoing key theoretical insights that can stem from specific message manipulations and 2) inadvertently introducing message confounds. To address this issue, we introduce construal-level theory as the theoretical lens to design and identify potential confounds in fear-appeal manipulations. We further discuss how researchers can seamlessly integrate construal-level theory into information security studies based on protection motivation theory. Our work has important theoretical and methodological implications for IS security researchers

Security Goal Matters: Impact of Threat-Prevention and Threat-Detection Behavior on Security Outcomes

To reduce cyberattack risk, individuals are commonly encouraged to take security behaviors to prevent or detect IT threats. Previous research always generalized their empirical findings from specific security behaviors to all security behaviors, which is problematic because people who adopt different security behaviors may have different mechanisms and antecedents. This study uses the protection motivation theory (PMT) as a general theory and explores how the nature of security behavior (i.e., IT threat-detection behavior versus IT threat-prevention behavior) affects individuals’ security-related outcomes, as well as what factors influence the extent of these relationships. We introduce construal level theory (CLT) to argue that IT threat detection security behaviors (versus IT threat prevention security behaviors) strengthen the effects of threat perception (versus efficacy perception) on one’s protection motivation. We further propose that individuals’ construal level determines the extent of these relationships. Two online experiments will be used to verify our hypotheses

Scary Stories: Fear Appeals, Hopelessness and the Role of Response Efficacy in Protective Online Behavior

The issue of online threats is a topic of widespread notoriety and the target of voluminous research. In spite of this, recommended treatments do not seem to have been completely effective, as indicated by the prominence of identity theft among complaints to government agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission. The goal of this research is to produce a more complete and nuanced understanding of this problem and thus provide better guidance toward preventing identity theft. This work offers a 2 x 2 experiment that manipulates both Threat conditions and Response Efficacy in concert, testing for an interaction effect of Threat and Response Efficacy on Behavioral Intention, Fear, and Hopelessness. Our results indicate that a high Threat condition increases users’ intentions to take action against an online threat, as expected. However, we also find that Response Efficacy plays a critical role in how individuals react to online threats. Response Efficacy is found to relate negatively to Hopelessness. In addition, Fear is measured and discussed

Positively Fearful: Activating the Individual’s HERO Within to Explain Volitional Security Technology Adoption

Regardless of what security professionals do to motivate personal users to adopt security technologies volitionally, the end result seems to be the same—low adoption rates. To increase these rates, we propose activating their positive psychological capital (PsyCap), which consists of hope, self-efficacy, resilience, and optimism (i.e., their “HERO within”). We propose that greater PsyCap toward a security technology is associated with greater adoption rates (and intentions thereof) because positivity increases motivation. We further posit that PsyCap both moderates and is moderated by other constructs. We suggest that personal users’ conditioned fear from the security threat moderates the effect of PsyCap on adoption intentions because some fear is necessary to activate their positive PsyCap to form their behavioral intentions to adopt security technologies. We further hypothesize that PsyCap moderates the effect of adoption intentions on actual adoption rates because activating an individual’s HERO within encourages individuals to exert the effort necessary to translate their intentions into actual adoption. Finally, we theorize that enhancing fear appeal messages with appeals to an individual’s HERO has a greater effect on volitional adoption rates relative to messages without these PsyCap-related appeals. To support our hypotheses, we conducted two experiments using the volitional adoption of a password manager application and a two-factor authentication (2FA) service. We found differential support for our hypotheses across the two security technologies, which suggests technology characteristics might mitigate the impact of PsyCap on volitional adoption decisions

Social Distance and Information Avoidance in Public Security Events: A Dual Involvement Perspective

With the large spread of information thanks to ICT, public security events are increasingly focused on by the public. But meanwhile, the phenomenon of people’s information avoidance in these events still exists and even becomes more prominent. However, existing studies on information avoidance have ignored such an important context (i.e., public security event) and the influence of people’s perceptions of social relationship. To fill the gaps, we develop a model to explore the influence of social distance on information avoidance through two opposite mechanisms from a dual involvement perspective, perceived relevance and negative affect, in the context of public security events. We also consider self-efficacy’s moderating role to identify the boundary conditions. A scenario-based survey with college students was conducted to test the proposed research model. Finally, theoretical contributions and practical implications are discussed

Impact of communication appeals on recycling behaviors among undergraduate students

The present thesis aims to understand factors influencing student recycling behaviors, and to investigate effective communication approaches to increase such behaviors. An online survey was conducted to examine the relationships between student recycling frequency in different contexts, students’ attitudes toward the environment, barriers to their recycling, students’ perceptions of communication messages, and communication media they think to be effective. Descriptive statistics, ANOVAs, t-test, simple linear regressions, categorical multinomial logistic regression, and a chi-square test were conducted, and the data was collected from a large land-grant university in the Midwestern United States. A total of 537 questionnaires were answered. The main results of the present study are as follows: First, context as well as recycling barriers were factors that influenced student recycling behaviors. Most students who were likely to recycle at home would also recycle on campus, but students recycled more at home than on vacation. The main recycling barriers on campus were attitude barriers and knowledge barriers, while on vacation the main barriers were situational. Second, students thought positive messages were most effective in increasing recycling behavior, while students with less pro-environmental attitudes preferred neutral messages. “Clear, informative, and consistent bin infrastructure and bin labels” and “promotions such as recycling contests [and] competitions between departments or colleges” were found to be effective forms of communication. Additionally, when there were more significant factors such as the accessibility of recycling, student environmental attitudes did not play an important role in recycling behaviors on campus and on vacation. The study offers two practical recommendations. They are to increase recycling facilities and accessibility, and providing informative, clear recycling signs and labels with positive messages. Two suggestion are made for future research on the topic. They are to find factors that are more determinant than attitudes of environment about student recycling and to do more research on the usage of positive messages about student recycling behaviors

What do we mean when we say climate change is urgent?

Recent discussions of climate change in multiple domains—the academic literature, the popular press, political movements, and international climate policy regime—have increasingly framed the phenomenon as a “crisis,” an “emergency,” or an “urgent” situation. In this paper, we contextualize the time pressure of climate change in the broader social science literature, perform bibliometric and discourse analyses of this framing, and explore potential implications of this trend for climate decision making. While the increased prevalence of time pressure terms is arguably part and parcel of modernity, these terms are in general not synonymous. In the context of climate decision making, we find that “urgency” functions as a boundary object relaying the internalization of time pressure between (1) the academic literature and the international climate change policy regime and (2) political movements and the popular press; especially as construed in these latter domains, “crisis” and “emergency” connote time pressure but so too generate a constellation of other affective and cognitive states. A review of a set of related literatures suggests that the time pressure framing of climate change affects the quantity and quality of information and the range of options (e.g., geoengineering) considered in choice processes for mitigation and adaptation actions, as well as the sequencing and timing of chosen plan elements; furthermore, these effects likely vary in both direction and magnitude with characteristics of the individuals or organizations in which they manifest. Taken as a whole, the crisis framing of climate change is likely to polarize beliefs and actions, especially in the absence of accompanying information about self-efficacy and hope

Understanding extra-role security behaviors: An integration of self-determination theory and construal level theory

Extra-role security behaviors (ERSBs) – spontaneous security behaviors that are not prescribed in organizational security policies – are seen as a useful addition to securing informational assets in organizations. However, this exploratory study, based on findings obtained through 29 in-depth-interviews, challenges this positive perspective and shows that extra-role security behaviors cut both ways: They are either helpful or harmful. In addition, our results suggest that (1) ERSB contributes to varying degrees to the effectiveness of information security compliance, (2) the self-determination theory contributes to understanding the motivators for ERSB, and (3) the construal level theory of psychological distance explains the differential risk evaluation of ERSB. We discuss implications for researchers and practitioners – particularly in terms of promoting the beneficial nature of extra-role security behaviors – and suggest compelling avenues for future research

The Role of Financial Services Advertising on Investors\u27 Decision-Making

The present study assesses the effect of financial services advertising on investors’ decision-making by adopting a two-sided approach: a stimulus-side analysis to document the nature and prevalence of advertising strategies and advertising disclosures being used and a response-side investigation to examine the investors’ processing of and receptiveness to financial services advertising. By performing a content analysis of recently published financial services magazine advertisements, this study provides a contemporary look at whether and how financial services companies inform, persuade, and communicate with average investors. Results from this content analysis method is also used as a foundation to help design realistic test ads in the subsequent experimental design as a response-side approach. Combined with stimulus-side data, a between-group experimental design allows an empirical test of how the interaction between investors’ exposures to different advertising practices (i.e., advertising strategies and advertising disclosures) and individual regulatory focus might affect the ways investors perceive and evaluate the advertised financial product. In this stage, the likely processing and persuasive differences between advertising strategies and advertising disclosures and the potential moderating role of investors’ regulatory focus form the basis of the response-side approach to complement the content analysis phase. Results from the content analysis show that financial services companies increased informational advertising strategies and presented more advertising information during the three-year (2007-2009) period of interest. Findings indicate that financial services companies might play a role in enhancing the role of communication, information, and advertising in the marketplace for financial literacy. However, in order to adequately evaluate the range of investor’s response to advertising strategies and advertising disclosures, this study employs a two advertising strategies (information versus transformational) x two advertising disclosures (complete disclosure versus non-disclosure) x two regulatory focus (promotion-focused versus prevention-focused) between-subject, randomized, experimental design. Findings from the experimental design reveal that investors’ financial decision-making may be affected by internal characteristics (i.e., regulatory focus) as well as external information (i.e., advertising strategies and advertising disclosures). Especially, regulatory focus was found to be function as a moderating variable that can influence the direction and strength of relationship between different financial services advertising practices and the outcome variables of financial decision-making such as risk perceptions, product attitudes, and purchase intentions. Finally, theoretical, managerial, and policy implications are discussed and opportunities for the future research are identified

Giving to Be Seen: the Influence of Facebook Charitable Advertisements on Conspicuous Donation Behavior

The arduous financial environments that nonprofit organizations face today motivate nonprofits to continuously search and leverage new communication platforms such as social media to approach a wider individual donor base. This thesis examines whether a Facebook charitable appeal promoting a donation via Facebook Gifts may attract Facebook users to give for conspicuousness (a public display of a donation behavior). Findings of this thesis revealed a gender difference in responses to the Facebook charitable appeal due to the gender difference in self-construals such that men were more likely to give via Facebook Gifts when the ad promoting the donation via Facebook Gifts signaled a lower level of popularity (with fewer Likes ) whereas women tended to give via Facebook Gifts when the ad signaled a higher level of popularity (with more Likes ). This thesis has theoretical contributions to existing literature on self-construals and prosocial behavior as well as significant practical implications for nonprofits to design compelling, effective charitable appeals to attract male and female social media users respectively