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PP 501
The Influence of Privacy Control Options on the Evaluation and Usage Intentions of Mobile Applications for Volunteers in Crisis
Situations
L. Rösner
1
, S. Winter
1
, N. Krämer
1
1
University of Duisburg-Essen, Social Psychology: Media and Communication, Duisburg, Germany
By the continuous grow in smartphone prevalence worldwide and the cost-effective Internet access they provide, these advanced mobile technologies
offer new opportunities for the creation and development of systems for crisis communication and management. During crises like major catastrophic
events, rescue forces might not be able to adhere to the regular response time for simultaneously emerging (medical) emergencies. For these situations,
mobile technologies can be used to mobilize qualified volunteers from the general public to help the regular rescue forces (similar to first responders, see
Timmons &Vernon-Evans, 2012).This research investigates user acceptance of a concept for a smartphone application that can detect users in the proximity
of an emergency who are registered as voluntary helpers and assign them to the emergency site. Vital to the success of using mobile technologies for vol‑
unteers is to determine whether privacy issues affect user participation. Therefore, we build on agency models (Sundar, Jia, Waddell, & Huang, 2015) and
control theories in the context of information privacy (Xu & Hock-Hai, 2004) to investigate effects of data control options on the evaluation and willingness
to use a smartphone-based system for voluntary help. Moreover, we aim to shed light on the role of volunteering motives and mobile users’ privacy con‑
cerns in driving the willingness to participate. An online experiment (N=217) with a between-subjects design was conducted, in which participants were
introduced to the idea of the smartphone-based system for voluntary help. The app description either expressed high privacy control options for the app
user (high options for customization and choice, e.g., whether and when the smartphone is located), medium control options (limited choice and customi‑
zation, e.g., smartphone is located whenever help is needed and user is available), or low control options (no choice and customization, e.g., smartphone is
continuously located). Results of an ANOVA showed a significant effect of the app description on participants’evaluations: high control options led to a more
positive evaluation of the app. Moreover, we found that high as well as medium control options led to lower privacy concerns regarding the app use than
low control options. Mediation analyses revealed a significant indirect effect of high control options on app evaluation as well as on app usage intentions
through participants’ perceived privacy concerns regarding the app use. In addition, moderated regression analyses revealed that the information about
high data control options had a more pronounced influence on the intention to use the app for people with high career motivation regarding volunteering
and for people with high levels of mobile users’ information privacy concerns. This study highlights the importance of fair information practices (Culnan &
Armstrong, 1999), such as loading users with control over their personal data and putting them in charge to decide which data can be used, in the context
of mobile applications for volunteer engagement. Providing users with high control over their information privacy can be beneficial for the development
of mobile applications as it can have positive effects on the acceptance due to lower perceived privacy concerns.
PP 502
Social Perception and Communication Strategies in Risk Prevention. A National Security Perspective
M. Teodor
1
, V.I. Nicula
1
, I. Chiru
1
1
Mihai Viteazul National Intelligence Academy, National Intelligence Studies Institute, Bucharest, Romania
The management of and communication about risks has become a major question of public policy and intellectual debate in the modern world. In this
respect, risk perception research field has in recent decades gained more and more attention in the academic literature as an integral part of risk manage‑
ment and risk communication. The National Intelligence Academy„Mihai Viteazul”, through the National Institute for Intelligence Studies and the REACT
project, is one of the few institutions that were concerned about the research of risk perception in Romanian society, the aim being to improve and achieve
effective risk communication strategies concerning national security. Effective risk communication requires understanding where the public is coming from
in order to convince them to prepare better for risks. In this respect, starting from the assumption that the risk perceived is a complex concept, defined as
the possibility that a negative occurrence takes place and whose perception differs from one individual to the next, our research project proposes the use
of qualitative research methods (Q sort method) in order to measure and define Romanians’knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding national security
risks. Having greater knowledge in the field of social risk perception can thus improve the quality and impact of decisions throughout society, and the qual‑
ity of risk communication strategies. Therefore, the objective of our research is to contribute to the elaboration of solutions for the optimization of risk
communication strategies for national security institutions, through the analysis and evaluation of social perception over national security risks. Beyond
the academic contribution to the study of national security risks, we intend to provide an assessment of the perception of national security risks by the Ro‑
manian society, by conducting a research using the Q-sort method on a sample of individuals from the academic, private, civil society and institutional
(national security institutions) environment.
PP 503
Internal Branding and Employee Dissent via Online Public Outlets: Implications for Crisis Prevention and Communication
S. Ravazzani
1
, A. Mazzei
2
1
Aarhus University, Business Communication, Aarhus, Denmark
2
IULM University, Department of Marketing- Consumption- Communication and Behaviour, Milano, Italy
Our proposal focuses on a specific aspect of discursive dislocation and contesting in organisations: employee dissent via external online outlets. We link
this issue to internal branding and its role in preventing publicly visible crisis threats. Dissent research indicates that dissatisfied employees might choose
to either voice their concerns in the workplace, or remain silent (Morrison, Milliken 2000). Besides these two options, research outlines that silence does
not mean acquiescence and might be an indicator of dissenting voice acts expressed via alternative outlets (Kassing, 1997). Such a discursive dislocation
of dissent increasingly takes place in online outlets, where employees perceive higher public support and control over the discussion and their anonymity
(Gossett, Kilker, 2006). Dissent and negative comments disclosed via online public outlets can originate 'paracrises”(Coombs, Holladay, 2012) which require
extensive scanning, quick assessment and even improvisation (Falkheimer, Heide, 2010) to avoid severe consequences on the organisational reputation (Ul‑