Beyond concern: socio-demographic and attitudinal influences on privacy and disclosure choices

ABSTRACT

The co-option of consumers as unwilling agents in their own surveillance has enabled significant abuses of consumer privacy. Previous studies have largely used privacy concern as a proxy for overall privacy attitudes. In this study, we implement a choice experiment in combination with measures adapted from Communication Privacy Management theory to enable a broader exploration of the influences of privacy attitudes by contextualising privacy as a negotiation about accessibility over contextual boundaries. Key findings suggest individuals’ social media disclosure decisions are influenced at least in part by their privacy attitudes, particularly with respect to information categories which may cue other personal information. Findings are also presented on consumers’ willingness to pay for privacy, with implications for alternative revenue streams not built on consumer surveillance.

KEYWORDS:

• Consumer privacy
• privacy calculus
• communications privacy management theory
• social media

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplemental material

The supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2020.1715465.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Liam Pomfret

Liam Pomfret is a specialist in consumer privacy, with a focus on consumer decision making and behaviour for privacy protection, and disclosure of personal information. He has a particular interest in the application of systems thinking to the understanding of firms’ ethical responsibilities in marketing, and to understanding complex social problems to which marketing activities have contributed. He holds a position on the board of the Australian Privacy Foundation.

Josephine Previte

Josephine Previte is a Senior Lecturer in Marketing in the UQ Business School whose research focuses on the socio-cultural aspects of consumer behaviour, market systems, transformative service and social change. She is particularly interested in applying alternative research approaches such as Q methodology and interpretive textual and visual research methods to study social problems, gender and social technologies. She has worked on a broad range of social marketing projects, including alcohol consumption, breastfeeding, breast screening, blood donation and new technology use to deliver social marketing services. Her scholarship has appeared in the Journal of Macromarketing, Journal of Marketing Management, European Journal of Marketing, and Journal of Social Marketing.

Len Coote

Len Coote is an Associate Professor in Marketing in the UQ Business School. His primary academic contribution is to the study of economic choices. He is the Vice-Chair of the Australian Consortium for Social and Political Research, a non-profit consortium aiming to improve the quality of research in the social and behavioural sciences and encourage an evidence-based approach to government policymaking. His work has appeared in the Journal of Business Research, Journal of Marketing Management, Journal of Services Marketing and Journal of Choice Modelling.