The demand for information system authentication has significantly increased over the last decade. Research has shown that the majority of user authentications remain to be password based, however, it is well documented that passwords have significant limitations. To address this issue, companies have been placing increased requirements on the user to ensure their passwords are more complex and consequently stronger with little consideration on the impact on employee productivity. Thus, this study was set to determine the effects of changing the password strength (cognitive load) over time and its impact on employee productivity. An experiment with two experimental groups and one control group was conducted. Data was collected on the number of failed operating system logon attempts, users’ logon times, task completion times, and number of reset requests. The data collected from 72 participants was analyzed for group differences and when controlling for computer experience, age, and gender. Our results showed significant differences on all measures between the three groups. However, no significant differences were observed when controlling for computer experience, age, and gender. Furthermore, the results indicated a significant difference between the user’s perceptions about passwords before and after the experiment. Our results may help organizations to realize the point at which increasing authentication places a higher cognitive load on the users, which in turn affects their productivity.
Think Harder! Investigating the Effect of Password Strength on Cognitive Load during Password Creation
