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Determining the factors that influence the use of privacy configuration settinigs on facebook : an empirical study among adolescents

Destici, A. (2015) Determining the factors that influence the use of privacy configuration settinigs on facebook : an empirical study among adolescents.

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Abstract:An increasing number of people are making use of social networking sites (SNS) and this has changed the way how people live their lives. The current study aims at determining the factors influencing the use of Facebook’s privacy configuration settings among adolescent users in the Netherlands. The scientific value of the study is that it integrates the Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) and the Unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT). Since PMT provides a framework for understanding fear appeals and to understand if individuals are motivated to protect them on Facebook. UTAUT research has been done in information systems and information technology. It aims to explain user intentions. The societal value of this study is to find out what the awareness is of adolescents regarding the possibilities of privacy configuration settings on Facebook. This study is important since understanding their knowledge of privacy configuration settings of Facebook users in the Netherlands can result in implementation of more effective privacy measures. The study had a descriptive design and was done by means of a survey among adolescents between the ages of 13 and 17 from the Avila College and Lyceum the Grundel. Of approximately 300 distributed questionnaires, a total of 220 questionnaires were collected (response rate = 73%) between May 1st and July 1st 2015. after removing the incomplete or otherwise unusable questionnaires there were 195 usable questionnaires left. Perceived severity, Rewards, Effort expectancy, Social influence and Facebook experience are the significant factors that influence the use of privacy configuration settings on Facebook by adolescent users in the Netherlands. It can be concluded that the proposed model’s strongest predictor of an individual to use privacy configuration settings on Facebook is Effort expectancy, or the ability to protect their personal information and the ease of use of privacy configuration settings on Facebook. The second strongest predicting variable is Perceived severity, or the conclusion of the severity consequence resulting from a threatening security event. This study contributes to existing theory in a sense that it provided further evidence that the two concepts can be combined. This study performed extensive validity and reliability analyses and showed that all the adapted constructs in the reliability analyses have high reliability factors.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:05 communication studies
Programme:Communication Studies MSc (60713)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/68860
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