Towards Building Community Collective Efficacy for Managing Digital Privacy and Security within Older Adult Communities

Abstract

Older adults are increasingly becoming adopters of digital technologies, such as smartphones; however, this population remains particularly vulnerable to digital privacy and security threats. To date, most research on technology used among older adults focuses on helping individuals overcome their discomfort or lack of expertise with technology to protect them from such threats. Instead, we are interested in how communities of older adults work together to collectively manage their digital privacy and security. To do this, we surveyed 67 individuals across two older adult communities (59 older adults and eight employees or volunteers) and found that the community's collective efficacy for privacy and security was significantly correlated with the individuals' self-efficacy, power usage of technology, and their sense of community belonging. Community collective efficacy is a group's mutual belief in its ability to achieve a shared goal. Using social network analysis, we further unpacked these relationships to show that many older adults interact with others who have similar technological expertise, and closer-knit older adult communities that have low technology expertise (i.e., low power usage and self-efficacy) may increase their community collective efficacy for privacy and security by embedding facilitators (e.g., employees or volunteers) who have more technical expertise within their communities. Our work demonstrates how both peer influence and outside expertise can be leveraged to support older adults in managing their digital privacy and security.