In this study, we analyzed Web users concerns about potential risks and harms from Web use to themselves and to society at large. In addition, we assessed how strongly users felt something should be done to address their concerns. Seventy-two individuals, 24 each from...
Research Library
The world’s first globally accessible archive of research into the human aspect of cyber security and behavioural science as applied to cyber security awareness and online behavioural change.
To see the latest studies from pioneering academics, scroll down.
Role of self‐efficacy and behaviour change
Behaviour change is an important concept in relation to health promotion and disease prevention. Self-efficacy has been identified as an important determinant of health behaviour, future health behaviour and health behaviour change. In order to effectively facilitate...
Suicide: A study in sociology (Routledge Classics)
Why does suicide happen? What goes wrong? Why is it more common in some places than others? Emile Durkheim seeks out the answers in a classic text, offering an insight into the social frameworks in which we operate.
A domain-specific risk-attitude scale: Measuring risk perceptions and risk behaviors
Researchers find people's desire for risk is not consistent in all areas, and varies between things like financial, health and social realms. Regression analysis suggests the changes are due to changes in percieved benefits and risk, as opposed to changes in...
The need for affect: Individual differences in the motivation to approach or avoid emotions
Researchers developed and tested a new measure of 'the need for affect' (ie, the probability of someone approaching or avoiding emotion-inducing situations). They concluded the need for affect is important in understanding emotion-related processes.
Fears, phobias, and preparedness: Toward an evolved module of fear and fear learning
This paper discusses how fear can trigger elicitation and learning. It proposes fear is evolutionary, automatic and largely immune to conscious control and cites studies that support its propositions.
Security engineering
Psychology is a huge subject, ranging from neuroscience through to clinical topics, and spilling over into cognate disciplines from philosophy through artificial intelligence to sociology. Although it has been studied for much longer than computer science, our...
Personal fraud: The victims and the scams
Rsearchers find that fraud attempts are less likely to succeed if: the offender is a stranger; the initial contact is by telephone or mail; the potential victim has heard of the intended type of fraud beforehand, or; the potential victim attempts to investigate the...
Emotional distress regulation takes precedence over impulse control: If you feel bad, do It!
This paper investigated why our ability to control impulses wains during emotional distress. It found when people believed emotional distress to be long-term, they were better able to control impulses – suggesting indulging our impulses during times of distress is an...
Transforming the “weakest link”: A human-computer interaction approach for usable and effective security
This paper argues that simply blaming users for security breaches will not lead to more effective security systems and that security designers must address the causes of undesirable user behaviour to design effective security systems. Focusing on passwords in...