Ma Shuai, Chen Chen
School of International Business, Zhejiang Yuexiu University, Shaoxing, China.
China Institute of Regulation Research, Zhejiang University of Finance & Economics, Hangzhou, China.
Front Psychol. 2023 Aug 22;14:1224168. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1224168. eCollection 2023.
Privacy literacy is recognized as a crucial skill for safeguarding personal privacy online. However, self-assessed privacy literacy often diverges from actual literacy, revealing the presence of cognitive biases. The protection motivation theory (PMT) is widely used to explain privacy protection behavior, positing that whether individuals take defensive measures depends on their cognitive evaluation of threats and coping capabilities. However, the role of cognitive biases in this process has been understudied in previous research. This study focuses on Chinese digital natives and examines the differential impacts of subjective and objective privacy literacy on privacy protection behavior, as well as the role of cognitive biases in privacy decision-making. The results show that there is no significant correlation between subjective and objective privacy literacy, and a bias exists. When privacy concern is used as a mediating variable, there are significant differences in the paths through which subjective and objective privacy literacy influence privacy protection behavior. Furthermore, privacy literacy overconfidence moderates the relationship between privacy concern and privacy protection behavior. The findings confirm the influence of cognitive biases in privacy behavior decision-making and extend the PMT. This study also calls for the government to enhance privacy literacy training for digital natives to improve their privacy protection capabilities.
隐私素养被认为是在网络上保护个人隐私的一项关键技能。然而，自我评估的隐私素养往往与实际素养存在差异，这揭示了认知偏差的存在。保护动机理论（PMT）被广泛用于解释隐私保护行为，该理论认为个体是否采取防御措施取决于他们对威胁的认知评估和应对能力。然而，认知偏差在这一过程中的作用在以往研究中尚未得到充分探讨。本研究聚焦于中国数字原住民，考察主观和客观隐私素养对隐私保护行为的不同影响，以及认知偏差在隐私决策中的作用。结果表明，主观和客观隐私素养之间没有显著相关性，且存在偏差。当将隐私担忧作为中介变量时，主观和客观隐私素养影响隐私保护行为的路径存在显著差异。此外，隐私素养过度自信调节了隐私担忧与隐私保护行为之间的关系。研究结果证实了认知偏差在隐私行为决策中的影响，并扩展了保护动机理论。本研究还呼吁政府加强对数字原住民的隐私素养培训，以提高他们的隐私保护能力。
