An Exploratory Study of Bloggers\u27 Information Sharing Behavior: The Role of Online Privacy Concerns

Social networking websites have become very popular with Internet users as one of the latest forms of online communication tools. Blogs, recurrently updated web pages with a series of archived postings in social network websites have been discussed as a useful information sharing platform for knowledge management in a collaborative work environment. However, blogs generate growing concerns regarding information privacy issues. This study, based on social capital theory, presents exploratory results about bloggers’ information sharing behavior. The survey results indicate that trust which has four second order factors: economy based trust, trust in reciprocity, trust in other bloggers and trust in social interaction positively affects bloggers’ information sharing behavior. However, online information privacy concerns have a negative impact on the relationship between trust and bloggers’ information sharing behavior

Acceptance of feedbacks in reputation systems: the role of online social interactions

In an online environment, the aim of reputation systems is to let parties rate each other and to help consumers in deciding whether to transact with a given party. In current reputation systems for e-commerce, users have to trust unreliable information sources and anonymous people. As a result, users are not only hesitant to trust online seller but also to reputation systems. Therefore, there is a need to improve current reputation systems by allowing users to make buying decision based on reliable source of information. This paper proposes a new approach of sharing knowledge and experience in reputation systems by utilizing social interactions. This study examines the potentials of integrating social relations information in reputation systems by proposing a model of acceptance of feedbacks in reputation systems

Patients' learning in cyberspace: a thematic analysis of patient-patient discussions in a chronic illness Facebook page.

Online support groups play an increasingly important role in patients' lived experience of chronic illness. The objective of this study was to explore how learning takes place from patients' interactions in an online chronic illness support group. Qualitative data consisted of 1,478 messages posted to a publicly accessible non-illness specific Facebook support page. Data was analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Four themes were identified from the analysis. This paper presents two themes, information sharing and dis(trust). Employing Wenger's communities of practice theoretical framework (Wenger, 1998), themes are discussed in terms of learning, participation in practices and identity. Online support groups can be pivotal to learning in illness. Patients' online information sharing provides them with opportunities for informal learning about their condition to take place. These online interactions lead to patients developing trust for one another and distrust for the medical care system

What Trust means in the Sharing Economy: A provider perspective on Airbnb.com

Information and communication technology has fostered the rise of the sharing economy, enabling individuals to share excess capacity. In this paper, we focus on Airbnb.com, which is among the most prominent examples of the sharing economy. We take the perspective of an accommodation provider and investigate the concept of trust, which facilitates complete strangers to form temporal C2C relationships on Airbnb.com. In fact, the implications of trust in the sharing economy fundamentally differ to related online industries. In our research model, we investigate the formation of trust by incorporating two antecedents – ‘Disposition to trust’ and ‘Familiarity with Airbnb.com’. Furthermore, we differentiate between ‘Trust in Airbnb.com’ and ‘Trust in renters’ and examine their implications on two provider intentions. To seek support for our research model, we conducted a survey with 189 participants. The results show that both trust constructs are decisive to successfully initiate a sharing deal between two parties

Information quality, sharing and usage in farmer organizations: the case of rice value chains in Bugiri and Luwero Districts, Uganda

Published online: 13 July 2017Information is the connection of all components of a value chain network, activities and operations. Information transfer depends on the level of trust and interaction in the structure of the chain’s information system. This study was conducted on information quality, sharing and usage by two OSCAs in the rice value chain in Luwero and Bugiri districts, Uganda. The methodology used involved use of semi structured interviews, check lists for focus group discussions and key informant interviews. Seven focus group interviews were conducted, with an average attendance of six members per group (42 members) in Bugiri and 42 members in Luwero district. Interviews were also conducted for 30 key informants. A total of 114 respondents were interviewed in focus group discussions and as key informants. The information was analyzed with NVIVO software. Findings indicate that information sharing, type, quality content and usage of information depended on trust. Trust was a result of regular interactions among the network actors to learn more about each other. The result was exchange of more important and valuable information within the OSCAs. However, reliability of the information from actor perspective varied, with information from government actors being the least reliable and that from the private actors being the most reliable. Feedback was also an impediment to information sharing, caused by lack of trust among some actors. We recommend that it is imperative to have feedback within and among actors to enable establish trust and genuine sharing of information to address specific information gaps

An experiment on data sharing options designs for eHealth interventions

Background: With eHealth technology interventions, users' personal health data can be easily shared among different stakeholders. Users should decide with whom they want to share their data. As support, most eHealth technology has data sharing options functionalities. However, there is little research on how to design these visually. In this paper, we took two possible data sharing options designs - data and party perspective – for an existing eHealth technology intervention, and we explored them. Objective: The aim was to find which of the two designs is the best in terms of trust, privacy concerns, ease of use, and information control. Additionally, to investigate how these factors influence each other with also the goal of giving practical advice on designing for privacy. Method: We conducted a between-subjects online design experiment (N = 123). After having visualised one of the two data sharing options designs, participants filled in an online questionnaire. To analyse the data, t-test analyses, correlation analyses, and backward regression analyses were conducted. Results: Information control scored higher in the data perspective condition (t (97) = 2.25, p = .03). From the different regression analyses, we found that trust and ease of use play a role in all sharing-related factors. Conclusions: We concluded that the design of data-sharing options in eHealth technology affects the experience of the user, mostly for trust and ease of use. In the end, we provided several actionable design advices on how to design for privacy.</p

Privacy, Sharing, and Trust: The Facebook Study

Using sharing on Facebook as a case study, this Article presents empirical evidence suggesting that trust is a significant factor in individuals’ willingness to share personal information on online social networks. I then make two arguments, one that explains why Facebook is designed the way it is and one that calls for legal protection against unfair manipulation of users. I argue that Facebook is built on trust: the trust that exists between friends and the trust that exists between users and the platform. In particular, I describe how Facebook designs its platform and interface to leverage the trust we have in our friends to nudge us to share. Sometimes, that helps create a dynamic social environment: knowing what our friends are doing helps us determine when it is safe to interact. Other times, Facebook leverages trust to manipulate us into sharing information with advertisers. This should give us pause. Because Facebook uses trust-based design, users may be confused about the privacy effects of their behavior. Federal and state consumer and privacy protection regulators should step in

Using Online Photo Sharing to Support Parents with Type One Diabetic Children

The rise of online photo sharing platforms has encouraged an increasing number of people to share online their lived experience as a carer of a child with a chronic condition. This study aims to explore the effectiveness of using photo sharing platforms to support parents of chronically ill children. We use individual interviews and analysis of Instagram posts to study parents of Type 1 diabetic children who engage in photo sharing. Findings show online photo sharing supports parents in coping with their child’s condition and in sharing their experience with and supporting other parents. Photos have a significant capacity to deliver personal experience and therefore in enhancing relationships between participants. Participants express greater ability of photos over text in validating their experience. More specifically, personal photos create more trust in the provided information. This supports the idea that photo sharing can provide opportunities for emotions-focused coping skills better than text

An Application of a Model of Online Travel Community Behavior: Beliefs, Attitudes and Behaviors in C-Trip, a Chinese Online Travel Community

Online communities have become a popular and influential venue for tourism information sharing, yet little is known about membership behavior. The purpose of this study is to test a new model of online travel community beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. The model integrates measures proven in traditional consumer behavior theory such as satisfaction, trust and brand attitude, with behavioral measures unique to the online domain, such as stickiness. The results of an online survey of 145 members of C-Trip, a Chinese online community, indicate that the quality of the community significantly influences member satisfaction and trust. However, trust does not influence site stickiness or intention to transact. It is member satisfaction that significantly influences site stickiness, and in turn stickiness influences intention to transact. The relationship from online community quality, to member satisfaction, to stickiness, to transaction suggests a service blueprint for site operators to follow

Privacy, Trust, and Data Sharing in Web-Based and Mobile Research: Participant Perspectives in a Large Nationwide Sample of Men Who Have Sex With Men in the United States

Background: Modern research is heavily reliant on online and mobile technologies, which is particularly true among historically hard-to-reach populations such as gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBMSM). Despite this, very little empirical research has been published on participant perspectives about issues such as privacy, trust, and data sharing. Objective: The objective of our study was to analyze data from an online sample of 11,032 GBMSM in the United States to examine their trust in and perspectives on privacy and data sharing within online and mobile research. Methods: Participants were recruited via a social networking site or sexual networking app to complete an anonymous online survey. We conducted a series of repeated measures analyses adjusted for between-person factors to examine within-person differences in the following: (1) trust for guarding personal information across different venues (eg, online research conducted by a university vs. an online search engine); (2) privacy concerns about 12 different types of data for three distinct data activities (ie, collection by app owners, anonymous selling to third parties, and anonymous sharing with researchers); and (3) willingness to share those 12 different types of data with researchers. Due to the large sample size, we primarily reported measures of effect size as evidence of clinical significance. Results: Online research was rated as most trusted and was more trusted than online and mobile technology companies, such as app owners and search engines, by magnitudes of effect that were moderate-to-large (ηpartial2=0.06-0.11). Responding about 12 different types of data, participants expressed more concerns about data being anonymously sold to third-party partners (mean 7.6, median 10.0) and fewer concerns about data being collected by the app owners (mean 5.8, median 5.0) or shared anonymously with researchers (mean 4.6, median 3.0); differences were small-to-moderate in size (ηpartial2=0.01-0.03). Furthermore, participants were most willing to share their public profile information (eg, age) with researchers but least willing to share device usage information (eg, other apps installed); the comparisons were small-to-moderate in size (ηpartial2=0.03). Conclusions: Participants reported high levels of trust in online and mobile research, which is noteworthy given recent high-profile cases of corporate and government data security breaches and privacy violations. Researchers and ethical boards should keep up with technological shifts to maintain the ability to guard privacy and confidentiality and maintain trust. There was substantial variability in privacy concerns about and willingness to share different types of data, suggesting the need to gain consent for data sharing on a specific rather than broad basis. Finally, we saw evidence of a privacy paradox, whereby participants expressed privacy concerns about the very types of data-related activities they have likely already permitted through the terms of the apps and sites they use regularly