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1 – 10 of over 1000There is a need for behavioural research within the smartphone context to better understand users’ behaviour, as it is one of the reasons for the proliferation of mobile threats…
Abstract
Purpose
There is a need for behavioural research within the smartphone context to better understand users’ behaviour, as it is one of the reasons for the proliferation of mobile threats. This study aims to identify the human factors that affect smartphone users’ threat avoidance behaviour.
Design/methodology/approach
A structured literature review (SLR) was applied to answer the research question. A total of 27 sources were analysed, from which 16 codes emerged. After synthesis, six themes transpired.
Findings
Six factors were identified as drivers and/or challenges of smartphone users’ threat avoidance behaviour, namely, knowledge and awareness, misconceptions and trust, cost and benefit considerations, carelessness, perceived measure effectiveness and the user’s perceived skills and efficacy.
Research limitations/implications
The results can encourage and provide a starting point for further research on human behaviour to improve smartphone user behaviour.
Practical implications
The mobile industry should focus on eradicating common misconceptions and undue trust in mobile security that is prevalent among smartphone users and make cost effective and usable interventions available. Training and awareness programs should be updated to include the factors that were identified in this study to affect smartphone users’ threat avoidance behaviour. In addition to improving users’ declarative knowledge concerning available smartphone measures and tools, procedural knowledge should also be improved to ensure proper use of available protective measures. Users should realise the importance of staying updated with evolving smartphone technology and associated threats.
Originality/value
This study acknowledges and supports the notion that addressing human behaviour is crucial in the fight against mobile threats. It addresses the need for behavioural research to analyse the factors that drive smartphone user behaviour. Furthermore, it uses and documents the use of a SLR, a research technique often unfamiliar among information security researchers.
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Peter Nyheim, Shi Xu, Lu Zhang and Anna S. Mattila
This paper aims to examine the effect of privacy concern, irritation and personalization on Millennials’ perceptions of personalized smartphone advertising avoidance in a…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the effect of privacy concern, irritation and personalization on Millennials’ perceptions of personalized smartphone advertising avoidance in a restaurant context. The hospitality industry has witnessed a huge surge in mobile activity over the past few years. Mobility opens up a new communication channel and allows industry to connect with their guests in a more personalized way. However, not all customers welcome the personalized advertisements.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from 159 Millennials enrolled in a large state university in the Eastern USA using an online self-administered survey. These Millennials were asked to use a restaurant’s smartphone application for 30 days and then complete a survey based on their perceptions of personalized advertising. Descriptive analysis, reliability, factor analysis and regression analysis were used to evaluate the relationships among the four constructs: privacy concern, irritation, personalization and advertising avoidance, with the first three variables as predictors and advertising avoidance as an outcome.
Findings
The results suggest that advertising irritation is positively related to advertising avoidance, perceived personalization is related with less advertising avoidance, while privacy concern is not related to advertising avoidance.
Originality/value
Although advertising avoidance has previously been studied for the past few decades, little research has explored the underlying mechanisms of the Millennials’ avoidance of personalized smartphone advertising in a restaurant context. The current research suggests information pertinent to strategies for marketing personalized smartphone advertisement for restaurant companies.
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Naurin Farooq Khan, Hajra Murtaza, Komal Malik, Muzammil Mahmood and Muhammad Aslam Asadi
This research aims to understand the smartphone security behavior using protection motivation theory (PMT) and tests the current PMT model employing statistical and predictive…
Abstract
Purpose
This research aims to understand the smartphone security behavior using protection motivation theory (PMT) and tests the current PMT model employing statistical and predictive analysis using machine learning (ML) algorithms.
Design/methodology/approach
This study employs a total of 241 questionnaire-based responses in a nonmandated security setting and uses multimethod approach. The research model includes both security intention and behavior making use of a valid smartphone security behavior scale. Structural equation modeling (SEM) – explanatory analysis was used in understanding the relationships. ML algorithms were employed to predict the accuracy of the PMT model in an experimental evaluation.
Findings
The results revealed that the threat-appraisal element of the PMT did not have any influence on the intention to secure smartphone while the response efficacy had a role in explaining the smartphone security intention and behavior. The ML predictive analysis showed that the protection motivation elements were able to predict smartphone security intention and behavior with an accuracy of 73%.
Research limitations/implications
The findings imply that the response efficacy of the individuals be improved by cybersecurity training programs in order to enhance the protection motivation. Researchers can test other PMT models, including fear appeals to improve the predictive accuracy.
Originality/value
This study is the first study that makes use of theory-driven SEM analysis and data-driven ML analysis to bridge the gap between smartphone security’s theory and practice.
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Haiping Zhao, Shengli Deng, Yong Liu, Sudi Xia, Eric Tze Kuan Lim and Chee-Wee Tan
Drawing on the Health Belief Model (HBM), this study aims to investigate the roles of health beliefs (i.e. perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on the Health Belief Model (HBM), this study aims to investigate the roles of health beliefs (i.e. perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits, perceived barriers, health self-efficacy and cues to action) in promoting college students’ smartphone avoidance intention.
Design/methodology/approach
Empirical data were collected through a cross-sectional survey questionnaire administered to 4,670 student smartphone users at a large university located in Central China. Further, a two-step Structural Equation Modeling was conducted using AMOS 22.0 software to test the hypothesized relationships in the research model.
Findings
Analytical results indicate that (1) perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits and health self-efficacy positively influence users’ smartphone avoidance intention; (2) perceived barriers negatively influence smartphone avoidance intention, while (3) cues to action reinforce the relationships between perceived susceptibility/perceived benefits and smartphone avoidance intention, but attenuate the relationships between perceived barriers/health self-efficacy and smartphone avoidance intention.
Research limitations/implications
This study demonstrates that HBM is invaluable in explaining and promoting users’ smartphone avoidance intention, thereby extending extant literature on both HBM and smartphone avoidance.
Originality/value
Research on smartphone avoidance is still in a nascent stage. This study contributes to the field by offering a fresh theoretical lens for pursuing this line of inquiry together with robust empirical evidence.
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Zhuomin Shi, Xiangyun Zhang, Chunji Jin and Qianying Huang
Given that Chinese brands and products are widespread in the global market, this paper aims to examine the effect of Chinese brand origin salience (vs not) on brand evaluations by…
Abstract
Purpose
Given that Chinese brands and products are widespread in the global market, this paper aims to examine the effect of Chinese brand origin salience (vs not) on brand evaluations by increasing global identity perceptions, and figuring out the moderating role of uncertainty avoidance.
Design/methodology/approach
Three experiments were conducted in different product categories to test the effect of Chinese brand origin salience. Study 1 and Study 2 collected data from different countries (i.e. Japan and the USA) with varying levels of uncertainty avoidance. In Study 3, the data were collected from the single-country sample, including participants from cultural backgrounds with high (Asian Americans) and low (Caucasian Americans) uncertainty avoidance.
Findings
Chinese brand origin salience positively influences brand evaluations via increased global identity perceptions. In addition, uncertainty avoidance plays a moderating role in the process. Specifically, the favorable effect of Chinese brand origin salience on brand evaluations will be attenuated among consumers with high (vs low) uncertainty avoidance.
Originality/value
This paper demonstrates that Chinese brand origin salience can enhance brand evaluations beyond prior work focusing on the negative stereotypes of Chinese brands and their imitation of Western brands. Importantly, Chinese brands have become an important part of the global community as Chinese brand origin salience can evoke consumers’ global identity.
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Naresh Kumar Agarwal and Wenqing Lu
The purpose of this paper is to study smartphone use and its positive and negative effects and to provide recommendations for balanced use.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to study smartphone use and its positive and negative effects and to provide recommendations for balanced use.
Design/methodology/approach
To study phone use, this paper applies the uses and gratification theory and gathered interview data from 24 participants on the participants’ frequency of use, mode of communication, people contacted and the reasons for using their phones. This paper analyzes the pros and cons of using smartphones using the Yin-Yang worldview.
Findings
This paper finds that people use their smartphones for communication, entertainment and other specific functions. Ease of communication and multitasking are the key benefits, and overuse and disconnect from the real world are the detriments in smartphone use.
Research limitations/implications
The findings can enable future researchers and practitioners to view smartphones and their effects more holistically, rather than seeing it only from the negative or the positive lens.
Practical implications
The proposed framework can help the reader to consider their daily use of smartphones and their ways of balancing their presence in the virtual and the real worlds.
Originality/value
This paper proposes the Yin-Yang framework of smartphone use and provides recommendations for effective usage.
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Stephanie Bae, Jun Mo Kwon and Alyssa Bosley
The main purpose of this study is to investigate what affects a customer's decision to use the hotel smartphone applications when he/she makes a room reservation.
Abstract
Purpose
The main purpose of this study is to investigate what affects a customer's decision to use the hotel smartphone applications when he/she makes a room reservation.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 266 usable data was collected through an online survey. The research model was tested using confirmatory factor analyses and structural equation modeling.
Findings
This study revealed that perceived usefulness, perceived credibility, perceived equipment risk, and perceived change risk affected customers' intention to book a hotel room using hotel smartphone apps. Perceived ease of use did not have a significant effect on behavioral intention.
Originality/value
This study extended TAM and the existing literature of mobile technology in the lodging industry. This article explored both existing variables and new variables in studying customers' intention to use hotel smartphone apps when booking a hotel room.
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Nancy H. Brinson and Brian C. Britt
One of the most effective tools used by interactive marketers is personalized advertising, which allows consumers to directly respond to customized offers to purchase a brand’s…
Abstract
Purpose
One of the most effective tools used by interactive marketers is personalized advertising, which allows consumers to directly respond to customized offers to purchase a brand’s products and services. Yet, recent studies show many consumers are installing ad blockers to avoid personalized ads. This study aims to examine how ad skepticism, ad relevance and ad irritation predict ad avoidance directly, as well as indirectly through consumers’ attitudes toward personalized advertising. Also, considered were how these antecedents’ study in tandem to trigger consumers’ desire to avoid ads by installing ad-blocking software.
Design/methodology/approach
An online survey was administered to a pool of 1,313 paid panelists who were familiar with ad blocking and reported that they either currently used an ad blocker, previously used an ad blocker, were considering using an ad blocker or did neither use nor were they considering using an ad blocker. All hypotheses were addressed via path modeling using PROC CALIS in SAS 9.4.
Findings
Results indicate that attitudes toward personalized advertising are more complex than attitudes toward advertising in general and mediate the effect of ad relevance on ad avoidance. Likewise, trust in interactive marketers moderates attitude toward personalized advertising and the negative outcomes of ad avoidance and ad blocker usage among skeptical consumers. Also, the reported differences in ad avoidance based on participants’ current vs previous ad blocker usage suggest that former users are using a more sophisticated evaluation of the costs and benefits of using ad blockers.
Practical implications
Consumers’ trust in an interactive marketer to properly collect and use their information plays an important role in moderating negative outcomes associated with personalized advertising. Also, the key is the use of high-quality data (best obtained through a permission-based relationship with the consumer) to deliver relevant ads without stimulating reactance or (privacy-related) boundary turbulence. Findings suggest that bolstering trust by engaging in a transparent, permission-based relationship with consumers may mitigate the tendency to adopt ad blockers and enhance the effectiveness of interactive marketing efforts.
Originality/value
Ad blocking presents a significant threat to the effectiveness of interactive marketing efforts like personalized advertising. Previous research on the antecedents of ad blocking is limited, considers a broad range of factors and offers mixed findings. The present study examines an informed set of cognitive and affective factors suggested by previous ad blocking studies to predict consumers’ desire to avoid personalized ads by installing ad-blocking software. Given the continued threat to the interactive marketing industry posed by ad blocking, a greater understanding of consumers’ motivations to adopt and use ad blockers is critical.
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Oussama BenRhouma, Ali AlZahrani, Ahmad AlKhodre, Abdallah Namoun and Wasim Ahmad Bhat
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the private-data pertaining to the interaction of users with social media applications that can be recovered from second-hand Android…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the private-data pertaining to the interaction of users with social media applications that can be recovered from second-hand Android devices.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses a black-box testing-principles based methodology to develop use-cases that simulate real-world case-scenarios of the activities performed by the users on the social media application. The authors executed these use-cases in a controlled experiment and examined the Android smartphone to recover the private-data pertaining to these use-cases.
Findings
The results suggest that the social media data recovered from Android devices can reveal a complete timeline of activities performed by the user, identify all the videos watched, uploaded, shared and deleted by the user, disclose the username and user-id of the user, unveil the email addresses used by the user to download the application and share the videos with other users and expose the social network of the user on the platform. Forensic investigators may find this data helpful in investigating crimes such as cyber bullying, racism, blasphemy, vehicle thefts, road accidents and so on. However, this data-breach in Android devices is a threat to user's privacy, identity and profiling in second-hand market.
Practical implications
Perceived notion of data sanitisation as a result of application removal and factory-reset can have serious implications. Though being helpful to forensic investigators, it leaves the user vulnerable to privacy breach, identity theft, profiling and social network revealing in second-hand market. At the same time, users' sensitivity towards data-breach might compel users to refrain from selling their Android devices in second-hand market and hamper device recycling.
Originality/value
This study attempts to bridge the literature gap in social media data-breach in second-hand Android devices by experimentally determining the extent of the breach. The findings of this study can help digital forensic investigators in solving crimes such as vehicle theft, road accidents, cybercrimes and so on. It can assist smartphone users to decide whether to sell their smartphones in a second-hand market, and at the same time encourage developers and researchers to design methods of social media data sanitisation.
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S. J. Oswald A. J. Mascarenhas
More than at any other period in human history, humankind is currently at the crossroads of war or peace, growth or decline, progress or regress, life or death, and hell or…
Abstract
More than at any other period in human history, humankind is currently at the crossroads of war or peace, growth or decline, progress or regress, life or death, and hell or heaven. We cannot leave these opposite polarities and possibilities to politicians and bureaucrats, to chance and expediency. These are expressions of turbulent markets. We must design and invent, plan and predict, and monitor and control our future and that of our posterity. In this regard, the concept of human personhood cum human dignity and responsibility is a fundamental part of this new self-understanding and undertaking. Ethics and morality are critical components on this creative journey to destiny. Corporate ethics, in particular, requires the development of a clear understanding of the existential situation of turbulent markets – that is, the relationship between executive autonomy and freedom, between human creativity and innovation, and between human culture and corporate social responsibility. Other critical concepts such as accountability and moral responsibility, the ethics of rights and duties, the executive virtue of moral and ethical reasoning, the building of trusting and caring relationships, and the like will be discussed in subsequent chapters.