Comparing three models to explain precautionary online behavioural intentions

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to compare three social cognitive models in their ability to explain intentions of precautionary online behaviour. The models are: protection motivation theory (PMT), the reasoned action approach (RAA) and an integrated model comprising variables of these models. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from 1,200 Dutch users of online banking by means of an online survey and analysed using partial least squares path modelling method. Findings The two models equally explain about much of the variance in precautionary online behaviour; in the integrated model, the significant predictors of the two models remained significant. Precautionary online behaviour is largely driven by response efficacy, attitude towards behaviour and self-efficacy. Research limitations/implications One limitation is that the predictor variables – “self-efficacy” and “attitude” – are represented by one item only in the path-analysis because of high cross-loadings of the other items with the dependent variable. Practical implications The results give practitioners a potentially wider range of options to design preventative measures. Originality/value The three models are successfully applied to online banking. This paper concludes that both PMT and RAA make a unique contribution in explaining variance for precautionary online behaviour. This paper is a re-publication of a previous conference paper (Jansen and van Schaik, 2016).