The Influences of Employees' Emotions on their Cyber Security Protection Motivation Behaviour: A Theoretical Framework

At the employee level, cyber threats are a sensitive issue that requires further understanding. Cyber-attacks can have a multifaceted impact on an organisation. Psychological research has demonstrated that emotions influence individuals’ motivation to engage in cybersecurity protection behaviour. Most extant research focuses on how external influences may affect employees’ cyber security behaviours (e.g., understanding risk, rationality in policy decision-making, security regulations, compliance, ethical behaviour, etc.). Little research has been done to date on how employees’ internal emotions affect their motivations for cybersecurity protection. To bridge this gap, this paper aims to expand the research by establishing a model for measuring the effect of employees’ negative and positive emotions on their cybersecurity protection motivation behaviour. The model will emphasise self-efficacy as a mediating factor and cybersecurity awareness as a moderating factor, and this model is based on a comprehensive evaluation of the existing literature. More specifically, the proposed theoretical model was established by integrating the protection motivation theory (PMT), and the broaden and build theory (BBT) to understand the effects of negative and positive emotions on employees' cybersecurity protection motivation behaviour. This study opens the gates for future research on the role of emotions on employees’ cybersecurity protection motivation behaviour. Furthermore, understanding how emotions affect employees’ cybersecurity protection motivation will be a valuable contribution to academia, helping decision-makers and professionals deal with the effects of emotions regarding cybersecurity