People typically enhance their online personas by sharing favourable personal information.Nevertheless, sharing of unfavourable information about oneself still occurs and is essential insome online contexts (e.g. allowing negative reviews). It remains unclear why people revealpotentially damaging information. We conducted an online experiment (N=462) to explore theeffects of feedback properties and individual characteristics on online information sharing in twocontexts (social and socioeconomic) where personal ratings are essential. We allowed users toconceal their personal rating if it dropped below a threshold. The context was the primarydeterminant of the threshold users chose. Control availability and feedback content triggeredadditional considerations and caused some users to change their (non)disclosure choices.However, many users relied on their priors (experience, assumptions) rather than on newinformation. Ourfindings show how people may fail to identify the impact of nondisclosure, whichmay signal undesirable information to others. Thesefindings challenge the reliance on holdingusers solely accountable for their‘informedness’vis-à-vis disclosure of their personal information.

Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) are on the rise, yet the knowledge about privacy preferences by different types of drivers in this context needs to be improved. This paper presents survey-based research (N = 528) focusing on preferences of drivers from South Africa and the Nordic countries for data processing and sharing by ITS, including future vehicular ad hoc networks. Our results indicate regionally framed drivers’ privacy attitudes and behaviours. South African participants have higher privacy concerns and risk perception. However, their preferences to share location data with police, family and friends, emergency services, and insurance companies are higher. Moreover, the region significantly affects preferences for transparency and control and sharing frequency, as well as willingness to pay for privacy, which are higher among the South Africans. We discuss how our results on factors, including region, impacting drivers’ privacy preferences can contribute to the design of usable privacy and identity management for ITS.

Increasing dependency on digital technologies introduces queries related to well-being–when and how digital technology poses a threat, or when it is the most appreciated by users? People have some expectations before using technology, which sometimes may be met, but there might be a mismatch at other times. Nevertheless, the digitalization of services advances and companies modify existing or produce new technologies that do not satisfy users' demands, putting their well-being at risk. Through an empirical inquiry, the present research explores experiences with technologies to shed more light on the main factors that enrich or diminish technology value and influence well-being. Exploiting the circumstances created by the COVID-19 pandemic that fast-forwarded technology use and development, an online inquiry was conducted to assess positive and negative experiences of technologies, focusing on the contexts of work, learning, entertainment, information-seeking, and health. The findings from 578 participants indicate that depending on the role of technologybeing a substitute for certain activities or an opportunity to perform them differently–consequences on well-being can more or less follow expectations. The results are discussed in the context of past research and practical implications for, e.g. technology design or managerial changes that could help overcome users' current challenges. 

In most parts of the world, minors’ access to education is guaranteed, resulting in most of their time being spent in the school building. Similarly, school staff spend a relatively long time in the same building. This unique setting requires both groups to stay inside the school walls throughout the working days, which might negatively affect their well-being. Studies show that low indoor air quality might negatively affect well-being. Moreover, school staff and students mention other problems, such as worrisome declining students’ attendance, motivation, social relations, safety, stress, and pressure, among others. Technological solutions, such as IoT-based systems, might be one way to tackle the well-being issue at schools. However, most of the existing solutions focus on the quality of the indoor environment, disregarding the needs and pains of school inhabitants. In the current article, we present an investigation of how IoT-based solutions could extend beyond solely environment-measuring tools and fulfill the needs of school inhabitants. Through an interview study with eleven IoT experts guided by user (school inhabitants) requirements identified in the previous research, we assess functional and non-functional system requirements that such systems should build on. These are discussed against the five-layer IoT architecture model. Moreover, the study identifies barriers and benefits of IoT-based solutions, which are discussed in the context of existing scientific and legal frameworks. The exploratory findings presented in the paper could be used as a guide for decision-makers at schools to ensure that the students’ and staff’s well-being is maintained, as well as by IoT suppliers to produce holistic or compatible solutions that could be easily integrated into the unique contexts of school.

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a source of knowledge about the surrounding environment and people in such an environment. The insights collected by IoT can provide the knowledge needed to improve people’s health and overall well-being. Schools are one environment where IoT is scarcely applied, yet, it is expected that this is where children and teenagers spend most of their time. Drawing on previous findings, this paper presents preliminary results from qualitative inquiry investigating how and what IoT-based solutions could support health and well-being in elementary educational settings.

Information sharing on social networks is ubiquitous, intuitive, and occasionally accidental. However, people may be unaware of the potential negative consequences of disclosures, such as reputational damages. Yet, people use social networks to disclose information about themselves or others, advised only by their own experiences and the context-invariant informed consent mechanism. In two online experiments (N = 515 and N = 765), we investigated how to aid informed sharing decisions and associate them with the potential outcomes via notifications. Based on the measurements of sharing attitudes, our results showed that the effectiveness of informing the users via notifications may depend on the timing, content, and layout of the notifications, as well as on the users’ curiosity and rational cognitive style, motivating information processing. Furthermore, positive emotions may result in disregard of important information. We discuss the implications for user privacy and self-presentation. We provide recommendations on privacy-supporting system design and suggest directions for further research.

In a well-functioning digital economy, consumers should be able to make autonomous and informed choices, and companies compete fairly. One of the barriers preventing such well-functioning is dark patterns—designs that mislead users into making specific purchase-related choices. In this research, through a qualitative inquiry (expert interviews), we classify dark patterns based on the harmful ways such designs affect the digital market. Moreover, we analyze data using the behavior change framework and illustrate ways to prevent dark patterns and grant consumers greater protection and autonomy. Our exploratory results outline potential solutions policymakers might apply to improve digital market well-functioning.

Too often, while interacting with online technologies, we blindly agree to services’ terms and conditions (T&Cs). We often disregard their content—believing it is not worth engaging with the long, hard-to-understand texts. The inconspicuous display of online T&Cs on the user interface (UI) adds to our lack of engagement. Nevertheless, certain information included in T&Cs could help usmake optimal decisions. In this replication research, we investigate this issue in the purchasing context. We confirm and extend previous fndings through an online experiment (N = 987), showing that diferently presented T&Cs (icons, scroll, and cost cue) compared to hyperlinked text affect whether people open them, becoming aware. We also show the efect of decision-making style on the relationship between awareness and satisfaction. We discuss the possible use of these fndings to improve users’ informed decisions. We also highlight problems that diferent designs may pose, potentially increasing the information gap between users and service providers.

The unprecedented pandemic of the infectious coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is still ongoing. Considering the limitations and restrictions imposed by COVID-19, we explored the role of technology and the extent of usage by end-users. In our online survey, we investigated users’ perspectives on their use of technologies in different contexts (e.g., work, entertainment), taking into consideration intrinsic factors such as health consciousness, perceived social isolation, and pandemic-related concerns. Results from 218 respondents show a significant increase in technology use in all investigated contexts after the pandemic occurred. Moreover, the results suggest that different factors may contribute to such increases, depending on the context. It appears that perceived social isolation, concerns about the pandemic, and tracking have the most prominent influence on different use of technology. Furthermore, open-ended responses include beneficial opportunities, concerns & consequences, and behavioral transformations & adaptations due to COVID-19. Our findings provide insights for designing and developing new technologies, especially for communication and entertainment, to support users’ needs during a pandemic.