Technology-Mediated Dangerous Behaviors as Foraging for Social-Hedonic Rewards: The Role of Implied Inequality
Authors: Turel, Ofir
Journal: MIS Quarterly (2021)
<jats:p>Technology-mediated dangerous behaviors (TMDBs), such as posting selfies while driving or posting private information, are prevalent and potentially require interventions. Knowledge about the drivers of these, and specifically the role of information in stimulating such behaviors, is limited. To address this gap, this paper turns to foraging and risk-sensitivity theories. These theories suggest that animals engage in more dangerous behaviors when their perceived need for calories is high. Similarly, humans increase financial risk-taking when they perceive dissatisfaction with what they have. Importantly, inequality information can increase such perceptions and change people’s risk-taking propensity. Adapting these ideas, the paper postulates that TMDBs resemble food-seeking in animals in that they are goal oriented, can be dangerous, and yield unknown (probabilistic) rewards. Therefore, TMDBs are explained using foraging and risk-sensitivity theory angles. Focusing on social media users (Studies 1-4; four experiments; total n = 2,504), I argue that (1) it is reasonable to view users as foraging the “fields of social media” for social-hedonic rewards, (2) it is possible to…