The reliance on recognition and majority vote heuristics over privacy concerns when selecting smartphone apps among German and US consumers

ABSTRACT

The smartphone app market is a prime example of a digital market where consumers are tasked with selecting one option among a plethora of alternatives, at times indistinguishable from one another. Building upon findings on information processing and decision-making, we postulate that consumers follow simple (rather than complex) heuristic rules to navigate the app market. In particular, we focus on two such strategies: the recognition heuristic and the majority vote heuristic. App privacy information was also considered as a potentially salient cue in the decision-making process, given the personal data stored on smartphones. Results of a mixed-method design (behavioral analysis and think-aloud protocols) study with German (N = 18) and US (N = 25) students find a dominance of the recognition heuristic. Decisions are further supported by majority vote heuristics. Privacy information is largely disregarded, particularly by US participants. Implications for app market design and engagement are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Smartphones
• apps
• decision-making
• heuristics
• permissions
• privacy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Sven Joeckel (Ph.D., TU Ilmenau) is a Professor for Communication with a special focus on Children, Adolescents and Media at University of Erfurt, his research focuses on adolescents’ media use and effects, media and morality and mobile privacy. [email: [email protected]].

Leyla Dogruel (Ph.D., Freie Universität Berlin, Germany) is a research associate at the Institute of Media and Communication Studies at Freie Universität Berlin. Her research interests are media economics and media innovation research as well as decision-making for media products. [email: [email protected]].

Nicholas David Bowman (Ph.D., Michigan State University, USA) is associate professor of communication studies at West Virginia University. His research interests focuses on the cognitive, behavioral, physical, and social demands of interactive technology, such as video games, social media, and mobile technologies. [email: [email protected]].

Notes

1. Notably, data from this study is part of a larger exploratory analysis on mobile app selection (Dogruel, Joeckel, & Bowman, 2015; Bowman, Jöckel, & Dogruel, 2015).

2. We chose Spanish as a language that both US and German students might easily relate to, with Mexico as a Spanish speaking travel destination for US students and Spain as one of the most popular travel destination for Germans.

3. Participants are indicated by the following nomenclature G = German, U = US, M = Male, F = Female, plus an ID number, ranging from 1 to 32, numbers are given based on the research protocol and given independently for US and German participants. G_M_2 is a German, male participant with protocol number 2.