Abstract
This research assesses the determinants of Millennials protection motivation (or security intentions) on their actual use behavior when navigating online, considering the protective measures they adopt. Accordingly, we propose a model integrating variables from two widely accepted behavioral theories, the Protection Motivation Theory and the Reasoned Action Approach. An online survey was conducted, relying on the responses of 236 participants from different nationalities, which were analyzed through hierarchical multiple regression. Results show a gap between security intentions and use behavior and indicate safety habit strength and actual control as significant predictors of Millennials’ use behavior. By focusing not only on the users’ behavioral intentions but also on their actual use behavior, this research seeks to extend the previous literature on the topic.
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Acknowledgments
This work was funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (UID/ECO/00124/2013, UID/ECO/00124/2019 and Social Sciences DataLab, LISBOA-01-0145-FEDER-022209), POR Lisboa (LISBOA-01-0145-FEDER-007722, LISBOA-01-0145-FEDER-022209) and POR Norte (LISBOA-01-0145-FEDER-022209). The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest. All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
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Medeiros, A.S., Martinez, L.F., Martinez, L.M. (2020). Assessing the Determinants of Millennials’ Online Protective Behavior: How Their Protection Motivation Translates into Actual Use Behavior. In: Martínez-López, F.J., D'Alessandro, S. (eds) Advances in Digital Marketing and eCommerce. DMEC 2020. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-47595-6_20
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