well-consent
Abstract
Privacy-related decisions are complex and nuanced,
and consume extensive cognitive resources. Yet, people make
these kinds of decisions many times a day. This means that
they might not be able to invest significant cognitive resources in
making each and every decision. We tested the extent to which
the statements displayed to the users with the purpose of assuring
them that their security and privacy is protected would resonate
with people when they were considering whether or not to divulge
their personal health information to an online service. We carried
out two empirical investigations: (1) we used scenarios of health
data being transmitted securely to a health provider, and asked
participants to tell us what would convince them to divulge their
personal information. (2) We then used these statements in a
Q-sort to gauge subjective opinions of the persuasiveness of the
statements, and to reveal ‘ways of thinking’ engaged in by our
participants in this respect. We discovered that our participants
wanted to see evidence that the organisation was implementing
required security measures. Thus, our study suggests, despite a
common assumption, that people do care, and that they want
reassurance that companies are trustworthy custodians of their
health data.
