Johannes Breuer will attend the 2023 conference of the European Survey Research Association (ESRA) from July 17 to Juli 21, 2023 in Milano with a presentation about Sharing Digital Traces.
Abstract:
Digital trace data are increasingly used in the social sciences. As access to these data via platform APIs can be unreliable, a method for collecting digital trace data that has gained in popularity is data donation. Behind this background, this study applied a vignette experiment to investigate the general acceptability and personal willingness to share various data types (i.e., GPS, web tracking, LinkedIn, Facebook, and TikTok) for research purposes. Besides acceptability vs. willingness and the five data types, we also experimentally varied attributes of the sharing request related to with whom the data would be shared (third-party, own project, not mentioned) and whether privacy information about the security of the data sharing process was given (provided, not mentioned), resulting in 60 hypothetical data sharing scenarios. As additional respondent-level factors potentially influencing data sharing acceptability and willingness, we asked about data usage behaviors, privacy concerns, and attitudes toward open science.
The study was implemented in the probability-based German Internet Panel (GIP) in 2022, and the final sample includes about 3,800 respondents. Preliminary results show statistically significant differences between how acceptable people consider data sharing practices and how willing they are to share their own data with respect to different data types. Specifically, people show higher ratings of data sharing acceptability compared to the willingness to share their own data. Regarding the different data types, people reported that they would be more willing to share their LinkedIn and TikTok data than their GPS, web tracking, and Facebook data. A possible reason is that the latter data types are considered more private and sensitive. In contrast, with whom the data would be shared and whether information about data security was provided did not affect the responses to the respective sharing scenarios.
Citation:
Silber, H., Breuer, J., Daikeler, J., Felderer, B., Gerdon, F., Keusch, F., & Weiß, B. Sharing Digital Traces: Experimental Evidence on the Influence of the Data Type, the Recipient, and a Safe Transmission.