Concern about Fairness, Ethical Idealism and Demand for Formal Procedures of Information Management

Abstract

What factors can predict and explain customers' demand that formal procedures of information management be implemented in information intensive organizations? Using data collected from students at a large U.S. university, we investigate the effects of students' concern about fairness and their ethical idealism on students' demand that universities implement formal procedures in managing information about students stored in databases. We find that individuals' concern about fairness and their ethical idealism positively correlate with their demand for formalization of information management procedures in organizations. Implications of the findings for universities are discussed in light of ethics, strategy, design, control and administration of personal information management systems in organizations. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]