{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,3]],"date-time":"2026-02-03T21:31:18Z","timestamp":1770154278205,"version":"3.49.0"},"reference-count":51,"publisher":"Emerald","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,16]],"date-time":"2021-09-16T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1631750400000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/www.emerald.com\/insight\/site-policies"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["INTR"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2022,5,9]]},"abstract":"<jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Purpose<\/jats:title><jats:p>Firms continue to struggle with end users who do not follow recommended actions for safeguarding information security. Thus, the authors utilize insights gained from studies on heuristic processing of risk information to design cues in fear appeal messages more effectively so as to more strongly engender fear among users, which can in turn lead them to take protective actions toward information security. Specifically, four types of fear appeal cues are identified: numeric risk communication, social distance and goal framing in verbal risk communication and visual risk communication.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Design\/methodology\/approach<\/jats:title><jats:p>Drawing from protection motivation theory, the authors hypothesize that these fear appeal cues can engender fear among users to a greater extent. In addition, the authors hypothesize that users will perceive a higher level of severity and susceptibility when they perceive a large amount of fear. The research hypotheses were tested employing data collected through a laboratory experiment. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and regression analyses were performed to analyze the data.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Findings<\/jats:title><jats:p>The study's results suggest that numeric and visual risk communication cues in security notices can significantly increase the amount of fear felt by users. In addition, social distance was found to marginally increase the amount of fear felt by users. However, unlike our expectation, goal framing was not found to increase the amount of fear when the other three types of fear appeal cues were also given in a security notice. It was also found that induced fear can increase the severity and susceptibility of threats as perceived by users.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Originality\/value<\/jats:title><jats:p>The study contributes to the literature on fear appeal cues designed to promote users' security protection behaviors. No prior study has designed security notices featuring the four different types of fear appeal cues and empirically tested the effectiveness of those cues in inducing fear among users. The findings suggest that the design of fear appeal cues can be improved by understanding individuals' heuristic processing of risk information, which can be subject to cognitive biases.<\/jats:p><\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1108\/intr-01-2021-0065","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,15]],"date-time":"2021-09-15T07:16:02Z","timestamp":1631690162000},"page":"708-727","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":7,"title":["Fear appeal cues to motivate users' security protection behaviors: an empirical test of heuristic cues to enhance risk communication"],"prefix":"10.1108","volume":"32","author":[{"given":"Jongpil","family":"Park","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1216-2854","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jai-Yeol","family":"Son","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9374-759X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Kil-Soo","family":"Suh","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"140","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,9,16]]},"reference":[{"issue":"1","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref001","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"33","DOI":"10.1086\/321946","article-title":"\u2018I\u2019 seek pleasures and \u2018we\u2019 avoid pains: the role of self regulatory goals in information processing and persuasion","volume":"28","year":"2001","journal-title":"Journal of Consumer Research"},{"issue":"2","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref002","first-page":"608","article-title":"Design features of graphs in health risk communication: a systematic review","volume":"13","year":"2006","journal-title":"Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association"},{"issue":"3","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref003","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"613","DOI":"10.2307\/25750694","article-title":"Practicing safe computing: a multimethod empirical examination of home computer user security behavioral intentions","volume":"34","year":"2010","journal-title":"MIS Quarterly"},{"issue":"1","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref004","first-page":"192","article-title":"When to accentuate the negative: the effects of perceived efficacy and message framing on intentions to perform a health-related behavior","volume":"32","year":"1995","journal-title":"Journal of Marketing Research"},{"issue":"2","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref005","first-page":"411","article-title":"How to make a risk seem riskier: the ratio bias versus construal level theory","volume":"3","year":"2008","journal-title":"Judgment and Decision Making"},{"issue":"4","key":"key2022050606025524200_ref006","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"837","DOI":"10.25300\/MISQ\/2015\/39.4.5","article-title":"What do users have to fear? 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