Interacting With Social Media Websites Supporting Statement

Department of Commence

National Institute of Standards and Technology

Generic Clearance for Usability Data Collections

OMB Control No. 0693-0043

Expiration Date: 10/31/2012

Interacting with Social Media Websites

1. Explain who will be surveyed and why the group is appropriate to survey.

We are interested in what information users take into account when they decide to disclose personal information to websites. Specifically, we are interested in the Facebook Connect consent dialog, and how privacy information can be made more salient.

To answer this question, we will perform a laboratory study wherein users interact with three different websites that will request access to their Facebook profiles. We will observe whether they grant access, and how these decisions change based on how we present information to them. The exit survey will be used to collect qualitative data for their observed behaviors, as well as to gauge their stated privacy beliefs. We will collect responses from people who have used Facebook for >6 months, and who visit Facebook at least once per week—the average Facebook user, and appropriate for this usability survey.

2. Explain how the survey was developed including consultation with interested

parties, pretesting, and responses to suggestions for improvement.

The survey was developed based on previous privacy studies that the usability staff have performed. Similar background questions have been used by researchers at other institutions.

3. Explain how the survey will be conducted, how customers will be sampled if

fewer than all customers will be surveyed, expected response rate, and actions

your agency plans to take to improve the response rate.

Prior to the interview, each participant will have given informed consent to participate in the research study. After providing their participation consent, each participant will perform the laboratory experiment. Participants will then begin answering the in-depth survey questions.

The expected response rate will be 100% since each participant will complete the survey as it is administered by NIST usability staff.

4. Describe how the results of the survey will be analyzed and used to generalize

the results to the entire customer population.

We intend to analyze these results to examine whether users’ observed privacy behaviors match their stated privacy preferences. We also plan to observe how these behaviors change based on how privacy information is presented to them. These results will be published in peer reviewed journals and/or conference proceedings. The goal is to develop more effective guidance for providing users with informed consent dialogs.