Effects of Fear appeals and point of reference on the persuasiveness of IT security communications

Honglu Du, Heng Xu, Mary Beth Rosson, John M. Carroll

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

To better understand end users' security compliance behaviors, we designed an experimental study to investigate how fear appeals and point of reference manipulations could influence end users' security behavioral intentions. The findings suggest that fear appeals and point of reference collectively influence users' perceived persuasiveness of the IT security communication messages. Specifically, higher fear messages are generally more persuasive than low fear ones when the messages are self-referenced. However, in other-referenced messages, the levels of fear appeals do not make differences. Further, our results indicate that users regard IT security issues as peripheral for them and it is suggested that personalized IT security communications might have greater potential in successfully persuading end users for security compliance.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationIEEE ISI 2013 - 2013 IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics
Subtitle of host publicationBig Data, Emergent Threats, and Decision-Making in Security Informatics
Pages82-84
Number of pages3
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 9 2013
Event11th IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics, IEEE ISI 2013 - Seattle, WA, United States
Duration: Jun 4 2013Jun 7 2013

Publication series

NameIEEE ISI 2013 - 2013 IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics: Big Data, Emergent Threats, and Decision-Making in Security Informatics

Other

Other11th IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics, IEEE ISI 2013
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySeattle, WA
Period6/4/136/7/13

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Information Systems

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