Personal information concerns and provision in social network sites: Interplay between secure preservation and true presentation

Abstract

Encouraging users of social network sites (SNS) to actively provide personal information is vital if SNS are to prosper, but privacy concerns have hindered users from giving such information. Previous research dealing with privacy concerns has studied mostly worries about information misuse, focusing on the protection aspects of privacy. By adopting an interpersonal conception of privacy and communication privacy management theory, this study offers a new way of understanding privacy concerns by examining the social and presentational aspects of privacy. It examines privacy concerns in terms not only of others' misuse but of others' misunderstanding and personal information in terms not only of identity but of self‐presentational information. Furthermore, it investigates the ways in which information and social risks inherent in SNS influence privacy concerns. A structural equation modeling analysis of a cross‐sectional survey of 396 Facebook users finds that longer usage does not alleviate the impact of information risk on either concern, that a greater proportion of offline friends among one's SNS friends aggravates the impact of social risk on both concerns, and that concerns about information misuse affect the provision only of identity information, whereas concerns about information misunderstanding affect the provision of both identity and self‐presentational information.