An attitudinal ambivalence approach to examine inconsistent effects of privacy concerns on information disclosures

This study attempts to explain the mixed results regarding the direct and indirect effects of privacy concerns on individuals' information disclosures through the lens of attitudinal ambivalence. Attitudinal ambivalence denotes a state in which a person holds equivalently strong positive or negative evaluation toward a focal object or behavior simultaneously. We propose two alternative models to explain the inconsistent effects of privacy concerns: direct ambivalence model and indirect ambivalence model. In the direct ambivalence model, privacy concerns are conceptualized as an attitude and have a direct effect on information disclosure. The effect of privacy concerns on information disclosure could be weakened by ambivalence of positive and negative cognitive beliefs that form privacy concerns. On the other hand, the indirect ambivalence model considers privacy concerns as individual characteristics or value, and hypothesizes an indirect effect of privacy concerns through favorability of information disclosure. In this model, the indirect effect of privacy concerns would decrease when positive and negative cognitive beliefs, which constitute favorability toward information disclosure, is equivalently salient. Our results support both models and reveal that the effect of attitude on information disclosure is negatively moderated by attitudinal ambivalence.