PRIVACY VERSUS ACCESSIBILITY - THE IMPACT OF SITUATIONALLY CONDITIONED BELIEF

The information age we are living in and the technology that supports it, raises new ethical concerns. Among these concerns are privacy - th e rights of individuals to withold information they consider sensitive , and accessibility - the rights of individuals to obtain information that is relevant to the decisions they must make. Arguments about pote ntial impacts of information technology on privacy and accessibility m ask and underlying conflict - that one person's beliefs about their ri ght to relevant information is likely to conflict with another person' s belief's about their right to withold information they consider sens itive. This paper proposes that the conflict is likely to be a functio n of the role the individual plays in the decision making situation si tuationally conditioned belief (SCB) - rather than a function of the p erson's underlying ethical values. This paper presents an empirical st udy involving information privacy and accessibility in routine busines s and market decisions, designed to reveal the presence of SCBs. The r esults indicate that SCBs cause a gap in beliefs about information acc essibility and privacy. Impacts of the SCB gap are discussed. A negoti ation technique called information exchange is suggested as a means of closing the SCB gap in routine business and market transactions.