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The current study aims to improve the requirements engineering RE communication, as often times projects fail due to poorly specified or misunderstood requirements. We use design science methods to build and evaluate a conceptual model... more
The current study aims to improve the requirements engineering RE communication, as often times projects fail due to poorly specified or misunderstood requirements. We use design science methods to build and evaluate a conceptual model which can add value to managers by offering them a set of guidelines and best practices for facilitating the RE communication. We did a qualitative study to investigate what the criteria are for selecting communication artifacts and we discovered that organizational culture plays a key role in this process. We demonstrate that the used artifacts need to adequately reflect the dynamic and intensity of the communication. Finally, we extend the RE process by adding two transitional phases to avoid requirements slipping through the gaps. Our findings indicate that such transitions are more distinct in traditional waterfall organizations and less salient in agile companies. The current study approaches the RE communication process from a design science perspective which adds more knowledge on the topic and addresses some existing issues leading to project failure.
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As competition increases in the online world, website owners will investigate ways in which they can attract more users. Additionally, many consumers suffer ever-increasing time limitations when browsing for a particular item on a... more
As competition increases in the online world, website owners will investigate ways in which they can attract more users. Additionally, many consumers suffer ever-increasing time limitations when browsing for a particular item on a website. Users can become frustrated and stressed when they are unable to find those items due to poor information scent, or semantic cues that are meant to lead to their goal. This paper presents and tests a theoretical model to predict how information scent can reduce the amount of stress that consumers experience when seeking information under time constraints. The study also demonstrates the relationships between information scent, time constraints, stress, performance and attitudes toward the website. Results indicate that while high information scent is an important design goal, scent can only be assessed by taking the user’s task into account
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We discuss research on GENI, a program of multiple cyberinfrastructure (CI) projects. Drawing on the concept of technological frames we discuss how the projects’ stakeholders perceived and presented the competing technologies that were... more
We discuss research on GENI, a program of multiple cyberinfrastructure (CI) projects. Drawing on the concept of technological frames we discuss how the projects’ stakeholders perceived and presented the competing technologies that were part of GENI and how they attempted to influence GENI’s development.
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Abstract This work investigates the independent and joint influences of suggestive guidance and credibility indicators in a repeated choice environment laden with risk and uncertainty. Consistent with expectations, results from two... more
Abstract This work investigates the independent and joint influences of suggestive guidance and credibility indicators in a repeated choice environment laden with risk and uncertainty. Consistent with expectations, results from two studies reveal that aggressive and conservative suggestive guidance influence participant decision making. Credibility indicators partially moderate these relationships such that low credibility indicators lead to increased risk taking when suggestive guidance is conservative and decreased risk taking when suggestive guidance is aggressive. Post hoc analyses designed to examine differences in results across the two studies reveal unexpected differences in risk trends across participant type. Together, these findings contribute to the decision support system (DSS) literature by illustrating how credibility indicators can push users toward or away from either beneficial or detrimental suggestive guidance, and further, by challenging the commonly held assumption that inexperienced and experienced decision makers accept similar levels of risk in DSS settings where risk and uncertainty prevail.
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Research Interests: Information Systems, Psychology, Computer Science, Information Security, Behavior, and 12 moreComputer Security, Applied Economics, Business and Management, Coping, Intentions, Threat, Fear Appeals, Internet privacy, Personally Identifiable Information, Protection Motivation Theory, Fear Appeal, and model comparison
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A key approach in many organizations to address the myriad of information security threats is encouraging employees to better understand and comply with information security policies (ISPs). Despite a significant body of academic research... more
A key approach in many organizations to address the myriad of information security threats is encouraging employees to better understand and comply with information security policies (ISPs). Despite a significant body of academic research in this area, a commonly held but questionable assumption in these studies is that noncompliance simply represents the opposite of compliance. Hence, explaining compliance is only half of the story, and there is a pressing need to understand the causes of noncompliance, as well. If organizational leaders understood what leads a normally compliant employee to become noncompliant, future security breaches might be avoided or minimized. In this study, we found that compliant and noncompliant behaviors can be better explained by uncovering actions that focus not only on efficacious coping behaviors, but also those that focus on frustrated users who must sometimes cope with emotions, too. Employees working from a basis of emotion-focused coping are unab...
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This paper aims to contribute to the concept of ethical CIO leadership through a distinctive focus on virtue ethics. Our research investigates the theoretical significance of CIO virtues on two CIO capabilities and their corresponding... more
This paper aims to contribute to the concept of ethical CIO leadership through a distinctive focus on virtue ethics. Our research investigates the theoretical significance of CIO virtues on two CIO capabilities and their corresponding influence on the CIO's role effectiveness in organizations.
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This research investigates the independent and joint influences of suggestive guidance and credibility indicators in a repeated choice environment laden with risk and uncertainty. Consistent with expectations, results from two studies... more
This research investigates the independent and joint influences of suggestive guidance and credibility indicators in a repeated choice environment laden with risk and uncertainty. Consistent with expectations, results from two studies reveal that aggressive and conservative suggestive guidance influence participant decision-making. Credibility indicators partially moderate these relationships such that low credibility indicators lead to increased risk taking when suggestive guidance is conservative and decreased risk taking when suggestive guidance is aggressive. Post-hoc analyses designed to examine differences in results across the two studies reveal unexpected differences in risk trends across participant type. Together, these findings contribute to the decision support system (DSS) literature by illustrating how credibility indicators can push users towards or away from either beneficial or detrimental suggestive guidance, and further, by challenging the commonly held assumption...
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ABSTRACT Trust and distrust are both considered to be crucial in online truster-trustee relationships. Although some research has proposed that trust and distrust are distinct, other research continues to hold that they are merely... more
ABSTRACT Trust and distrust are both considered to be crucial in online truster-trustee relationships. Although some research has proposed that trust and distrust are distinct, other research continues to hold that they are merely opposite ends of the same continuum. Given this debate, it is important to consider how distrust is distinguished from trust. To that end, this paper extends the nomological network of distrust and introduces two novel antecedents never introduced in online behavior literature: situational abnormalities and suspicion. For this nomological network, we also propose that trust and distrust coexist in online e-commerce relationships and can result in ambivalence when they both have high attitudinal values (represented in emotions, beliefs, or behaviors). Using an empirical study of online consumer behavior with 521 experienced online consumers, we found strong empirical validation for our newly proposed model. We provide evidence that suspicion and situational abnormalities are separate, important antecedents to distrust. We also examine the effect of ambivalence on the truster’s intentions toward the website and find a small positive effect that increases the user’s intentions toward the website. Finally, we empirically demonstrate the coexistence of trust and distrust as separate constructs and emphasize that distrust has a much larger impact on the truster’s intentions than does trust. We conclude with implications for theory and practice, along with a discussion of the limitations of and future opportunities revealed by this study.
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ABSTRACT Research on the behavioral-based security of information systems within organizations and for personal use has been common over the last decade, however little is known regarding how individuals perceive the security of their... more
ABSTRACT Research on the behavioral-based security of information systems within organizations and for personal use has been common over the last decade, however little is known regarding how individuals perceive the security of their mobile devices. This study seeks to explore how the security notifications within a mobile application environment alter adoption and security-related beliefs concerning their device. We propose a theoretical model based on the technology adoption and psychological theories, and propose an experiment to test the model. Contributions and implications of the work are then proposed.
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ABSTRACT Previous research has revealed that mere exposure to a website can positively influence a user’s experience with that website. This research extends this line of investigation by looking into the influence of familiarity on ads... more
ABSTRACT Previous research has revealed that mere exposure to a website can positively influence a user’s experience with that website. This research extends this line of investigation by looking into the influence of familiarity on ads that appear on a website as well as the website itself. The results revealed familiarity to have a significant impact on ad evaluation directly and website quality indi-rectly (through ad entertainment and informativeness)
Research Interests: Experiment and Internet
ABSTRACT This paper proposes the Unified Trust-Distrust Model (UTDM) to reconcile the differences in the literature on the complex relationship between trust and distrust. Extant research on trust and distrust follows two main approaches... more
ABSTRACT This paper proposes the Unified Trust-Distrust Model (UTDM) to reconcile the differences in the literature on the complex relationship between trust and distrust. Extant research on trust and distrust follows two main approaches that are built on contradictory assumptions: trust has been conceptualized as a different construct than distrust by some researchers, while others consider trust and distrust to represent opposite ends of a single continuum. UTDM expands upon both of these approaches while resolving their contradictions; thus, UTDM provides a novel view of the trust-distrust relationship that has the potential for more explanatory power than previous models. Further, UTDM introduces ambivalence to the trust-distrust literature as a possible consequence of contradictory trust and distrust attitudes, and as an antecedent of trusting intentions. Ambivalence was shown in previous research to attenuate the relationship between trusting beliefs and trusting intentions. UTDM further expands the trust-distrust literature by expanding the nomological network of distrust by proposing two new antecedents of distrust: suspicion and situational abnormality. The measurement of this model is then discussed along with future research possibilities that naturally result from this model.
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The central theme of this paper is that information technology (IT) can create ethical organizations endowed with virtuous characteristics, and that such ethical organizations can innovate better in today’s dynamic market environment.... more
The central theme of this paper is that information technology (IT) can create ethical organizations endowed with virtuous characteristics, and that such ethical organizations can innovate better in today’s dynamic market environment. Drawing upon the notion of virtue ethics propounded by the Greek philosopher Aristotle, we theorize that core organizational IT affordances influence the development of organizational virtues, which in turn influence organizational improvisational capabilities and innovation. We propose the “IT-virtues-innovation” (IVI) model and test it using a cross-organizational survey of 250 employees from various organizations in the United States. Our findings largely support our proposal that IT affordances positively influence organizational virtues, which then influence organizational improvisational capabilities, thus improving organizational innovation. This paper contributes to the understanding of organizational innovation by articulating the strategic usefulness of IT-enabled organizational ethics, and it explains how IT-enabled ethical competence (virtues) influences strategic competence (improvisational capabilities and innovation).
As competition increases in the online world, website owners will investigate ways in which they can attract more users. Additionally, many consumers suffer ever-increasing time limitations when browsing for a particular item on a... more
As competition increases in the online world, website owners will investigate ways in which they can attract more users. Additionally, many consumers suffer ever-increasing time limitations when browsing for a particular item on a website. Users can become frustrated and stressed when they are unable to find those items due to poor information scent, or semantic cues that are meant
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Because violations of information security (ISec) and privacy have become ubiquitous in both personal and work environments, academic attention to ISec and privacy has taken on paramount importance. Consequently, a key focus of ISec... more
Because violations of information security (ISec) and privacy have become ubiquitous in both personal and work environments, academic attention to ISec and privacy has taken on paramount importance. Consequently, a key focus of ISec research has been discovering ways to motivate individuals to engage in more secure behaviors. Over time, the protection motivation theory (PMT) has become a leading theoretical foundation used in ISec research to help motivate individuals to change their security-related behaviors to protect themselves and their organizations. Our careful review of the foundation for PMT identified three opportunities for improving ISec PMT research. First, extant ISec studies do not use the full nomology of PMT constructs. Second, only one study uses fear-appeal manipulations, even though these are a core element of PMT, and virtually no ISec study models or measures fear. Third, whereas these studies have made excellent progress in predicting security intentions, none of them have addressed actual security behaviors.
This article describes the theoretical foundation of these three opportunities for improvement. We tested the nomology of PMT, including manipulated fear appeals, in two different ISec contexts that model PMT’s modern theoretical treatment more closely than do extant ISec studies. The first data collection was a longitudinal study in the context of data backups. The second study was a short-term cross-sectional study in the context of anti-malware software. Our new model demonstrated better results and stronger fit than the existing models and confirmed the efficacy of the three potential improvements we identified.
This article describes the theoretical foundation of these three opportunities for improvement. We tested the nomology of PMT, including manipulated fear appeals, in two different ISec contexts that model PMT’s modern theoretical treatment more closely than do extant ISec studies. The first data collection was a longitudinal study in the context of data backups. The second study was a short-term cross-sectional study in the context of anti-malware software. Our new model demonstrated better results and stronger fit than the existing models and confirmed the efficacy of the three potential improvements we identified.
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Online Social Media Deviance (OSMD) is one the rise; however, research in this area traditionally has lacked a strong theoretical foundation. Following calls to reveal the theoretical underpinnings of this complex phenomenon, our study... more
Online Social Media Deviance (OSMD) is one the rise; however, research in this area traditionally has lacked a strong theoretical foundation. Following calls to reveal the theoretical underpinnings of this complex phenomenon, our study examines the causes of OSMD from several novel angles not used in the literature before, including: (1) the influence of control imbalances (CIs) on deviant behavior, (2) the role of perceived accountability and deindividuation in engendering CI, (3) and the role of IT in influencing accountability and deindividuation. Using an innovative factorial survey method that enabled us to manipulate the IT artifacts for a nuanced view, we tested our model with 507 adults and found strong support for our model. The results should thus have a strong impetus not only on future SM research but also for social media (SM) designers who can use these ideas to further develop SM networks that are safe, supportive, responsible, and constructive.
The explosive global adoption of mobile applications (i.e., apps) has been fraught with security and privacy issues. App users typically have a poor understanding of information security; worse, they routinely ignore security... more
The explosive global adoption of mobile applications (i.e., apps) has been fraught with security and privacy issues. App users typically have a poor understanding of information security; worse, they routinely ignore security notifications designed to increase security on apps. By considering both mobile app interface usability and mobile security notification (MSN) design, we investigate how security perceptions of apps are formed and how these perceptions influence users’ intentions to continue using apps. Accordingly, we designed and conducted a set of controlled survey experiments with 317 participants in different MSN interface scenarios by manipulating the types of MSN interfaces (i.e., high vs. low disruption), the context (hedonic vs. utilitarian scenarios), and the degree of MSN intrusiveness (high vs. low intrusiveness). We found that both app interface usability and the design of MSNs significantly impacted users’ perceived security, which, in turn, has a positive influence on users’ intention to continue using the app. In addition, we identified an important conundrum: disruptive MSNs—a common approach to delivering MSNs—irritate users and negatively influence their perceptions of app security. Thus, our results directly challenge current practice. If these results hold, current practice should shift away from MSNs that interrupt task performance.
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As online transactions continue to increase and become a significant part of the global economy, the ability to accept payments online becomes more important for businesses. This paper evaluates the literature and provides current... more
As online transactions continue to increase and become a significant part of the global economy, the ability to accept payments online becomes more important for businesses. This paper evaluates the literature and provides current information for IS researchers and instructors focusing on electronic commerce. In this paper, we explore the components of e-credit providers (conventional, person-to-person, and third-party) and explain how each system processes a single transaction. We then analyze several market leaders in each segment and summarize the strengths and weaknesses of each company. We provide guidelines for selecting an e-credit provider and highlight the options that apply best to online businesses. Finally, we outline potential areas of future research and provide a simple tutorial on creating a business account with PayPal website Payments Standard as an example of an online payment provider.
The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the workspace, thrusting countless employees from organizational work settings to their homes, where they work virtually to access key organizational assets through their cyberinfrastructure. This... more
The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the workspace, thrusting countless employees from organizational work settings to their homes, where they work virtually to access key organizational assets through their cyberinfrastructure. This large-scale virtual workforce imposes drastic cybersecurity issues, threats, and challenges to organizations. To onboard and train employees, companies are left with mainly virtual means to deliver SETA training, using two common training approaches: rule-based and mindfulness. Employees are also facing more challenges and distractions at home where practicing rules and mindfulness can become particularly difficult. Drawing on inoculation theory, this study proposes a new training approach to promote higher resiliency and “umbrella protection” against increasing phishing attacks. This study plans to conduct a mobile phishing SETA training field study at an organization to empirically examine the efficacy of the proposed inoculation-based security training method for work-from-home scenarios.