Can Global, Extended, and Repeated Ransomware Attacks Overcome the User's Status Quo Bias and Cause a Switch of System?

Ransomware (RW) attacks’ effectiveness has increased causing far reaching consequences that are not fully understood. The ability to disrupt core services, the global reach, extended duration and the repetition has increased their ability to harm an organization. One aspect that needs to be understood better is the effect on the user. The user in the current environment is exposed to new technologies that might be adopted but there are also habits of using existing systems. The habits have developed over time with trust increasing in the organization in contact directly and the institutions supporting it. This research explores whether the global, extended and repeated RW attacks reduce the trust and inertia sufficiently to change long held habits in using information systems. The model tested measures the effect of the RW attack on the e-commerce status quo to evaluate if it is significant enough to overcome the user’s resistance to change.

How to Influence Users’ Willingness to Explore the Use of Sports and Fitness Apps in China

The aim of this paper is to investigate how inertia affects users' willingness to explore the use of sports and fitness apps under the influence of status quo bias, and to explore the role of health goals in the process of exploring use based on goal setting theory. The population in this research is Chinese users who have already installed or used a sports and fitness app on their mobile device. Through an online survey technique, we collected 449 valid questionnaires by convenience sampling method. The results confirm that inertia negatively influences the users’ willingness to explore the use of sports and fitness apps and that inertia negatively influences perceived need, which, in turn, reduces the willingness to explore the use of sports and fitness apps; Furthermore, this study also verified health goal positive moderate the relationship between inertia and perceived need, as well as the relationship inertia and users’ willingness to explore the use of sports and fitness apps, revealing that health goals can effectively adjust for the effects of status quo bias in mobile fitness exercise. This study provides useful suggestions for the development and operation of sports and fitness app enterprises to help them make suitable marketing strategies according to users' needs, thus promoting the long-term development of sports and fitness app enterprises.

On the Effect of Practice on Exploration and Exploitation of Options and Strategies

Insufficient exploration of one’s surroundings is at the root of many real-life problems, as demonstrated by many famous biases (e.g., the status quo bias, learned helplessness). The current work focuses on the emergence of this phenomenon at the strategy level: the tendency to under-explore the set of available choice strategies. We demonstrate that insufficient exploration of strategies can also manifest as excessive exploration between options. In such cases, interventions aimed at improving choices by reducing the costs of exploration of options are likely to fail. In Study 1, participants faced an exploration task that implies an infinite number of choice strategies and a small sub-set of (near) optimal solutions. We manipulated the amount of practice participants underwent during the first, shorter game and compared their performance in a second, longer game with an identical payoff structure. Our results show that regardless of the amount of practice, participants in all experimental groups tended to under-explore the strategy space and relied on a specific strategy that implied over-exploration of the option space. That is, under-exploration of strategies was manifested as over-exploration of options. In Study 2, we added a constraint that, on a subset of practice trials, forced participants to exploit familiar options. This manipulation almost doubled the per-trial average outcome on the comparable longer second game. This suggests that forcing participants to experience the effects of different (underexplored) strategy components during practice can greatly increase the chance they make better choices later on.

The Case Against Cognitive Enhancement: Responding to the Reversal Test

<p>In this thesis I argue against the use of genetic technologies to enhance human cognitive capacities. More specifically, I respond to Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord's "Reversal Test", which they use to argue in favour of genetic cognitive enhancement. The Reversal Test is a burden of proof challenge designed to diagnose status quo bias in arguments against enhancement. By noting that most of those who oppose raisingintelligence would also oppose lowering intelligence, the Reversal Test puts the onuson opponents of enhancement to explain why both increases and decreases in our cognitive capacity would be worse than the status quo (our current level of intelligence). Bostrom and Ord claim that if no good reasons can be provided, this indicates that the opposition to enhancement is influenced by status quo bias. Since cognitive biases cannot provide a moral reason against enhancement, opposition to genetic cognitive enhancement shown to be affected by status quo bias canaccordingly be discounted. The aim of my thesis, then, is to overcome the Reversal Test' s burden of proof challenge by showing that my reasons for opposing cognitive enhancement are notinfluenced by status quo bias. However, I do not argue that enhanced intelligence could not be beneficial to the individual. Instead, I claim that the probable unequal distribution of enhancements between the best- and worst-off would be likely to cause serious injustices to those who are unable to afford them.</p>

The Case Against Cognitive Enhancement: Responding to the Reversal Test

<p>In this thesis I argue against the use of genetic technologies to enhance human cognitive capacities. More specifically, I respond to Nick Bostrom and Toby Ord's "Reversal Test", which they use to argue in favour of genetic cognitive enhancement. The Reversal Test is a burden of proof challenge designed to diagnose status quo bias in arguments against enhancement. By noting that most of those who oppose raisingintelligence would also oppose lowering intelligence, the Reversal Test puts the onuson opponents of enhancement to explain why both increases and decreases in our cognitive capacity would be worse than the status quo (our current level of intelligence). Bostrom and Ord claim that if no good reasons can be provided, this indicates that the opposition to enhancement is influenced by status quo bias. Since cognitive biases cannot provide a moral reason against enhancement, opposition to genetic cognitive enhancement shown to be affected by status quo bias canaccordingly be discounted. The aim of my thesis, then, is to overcome the Reversal Test' s burden of proof challenge by showing that my reasons for opposing cognitive enhancement are notinfluenced by status quo bias. However, I do not argue that enhanced intelligence could not be beneficial to the individual. Instead, I claim that the probable unequal distribution of enhancements between the best- and worst-off would be likely to cause serious injustices to those who are unable to afford them.</p>

Acts of magic: Prototyping in innovative learning environments

Over recent years, innovative learning environments (ILEs) have become the default style of new-build educational architecture in New Zealand. While offering potential benefits, the implementation of ILEs represents a departure from established practice in most schools and therefore requires significant change leadership support in order to succeed. Prototyping ILE practices can help schools transition into new physical spaces by decreasing status quo bias while increasing individual and organisational readiness for change.

Why do Low-Income, High-Achieving Students not Apply to Top Universities?

In this study, the behavior of low-income, high-achieving students when applying to prestigious universities is analyzed. It was postulated that this behavior is due to a lack of information provided to these students and the effect of several behavioral heuristics that influence these students’ application decisions — namely, availability, simulation, and the status quo bias. This paper focuses on the behavior of low-income, high-achieving students who do not apply to prestigious students and therefore behave in a manner typical to their income level rather than their ability. These students, who are less likely to attend magnet schools or live in major metropolitan areas, are often left out of initiatives and college resources available to high-income students. To address this disparity, two solutions are proposed to encourage income-typical students to apply to prestigious universities: the continuation of test-optional policies and virtual college tours.

Do people want smarter ballots?

We ascertain whether citizens want to have smart ballots, that is, whether they appreciate having the possibility to express some support for more than one option (expression across options) and to indicate different levels of support for these options (expression within options). We conducted two independent yet complementary survey experiments at the time of the Super Tuesday Democratic primaries to examine which voting method citizens prefer, one with the real candidates in the states holding Democratic primaries and one with fictitious candidates in the whole country. In both surveys, respondents were asked to vote using four different voting rules: single, approval, rank, and point (score). After they cast their vote, respondents were asked how satisfied they were using each voting method. The findings are consistent in both studies: the single vote is the most preferred voting method. We show that this is a reflection of a status quo bias, as citizens’ views are strongly correlated with age.

ORGAN DONATION IN THE CONTEXT OF HUMAN TENDENCY TO BE CONSISTENT. CONSIDERATIONS WITH REFERENCE TO LAW AND PSYCHOLOGY

The text verifies the hypotheses that exploiting the human tendency to be consistent and introducing appropriate legal solutions can increase organ donation. The considerations found that there are arguments for the status quo bias (the tendency to be consistent) exists and affects humans. Concurrently, there are multiple rational psychological justifications for this kind of occurrences. Thus, the status quo bias can be exploited for increasing the organ donation, imposing on a person the decision regarding being willing to become an organ donor after their death or not, and count on this person not changing their decision in the future due to the tendency to be consistent. In Poland, such a solution could be introduced by adding the 7th item to the Article 11 section 1 of the Act on Vehicle Operators with the following wording: “declared that they agree or not to the removal of cells, tissues or organs from their corpses for transplantation, or the removal of cells and tissues for transplanting them into another person. The declaration may be changed at any time.”