When security becomes personal & emotional: the influence of affective quality on personal security commitment

To capture the shift in today’s digital environment, where security responsibilities extend beyond the workplace to encompass personal banking, entertainment, social media, and cloud storage, we build on existing literature to conceptualise personal security commitment. Personal security commitment extends beyond organisational identification to personal contexts, where individuals strive to protect their own information assets. Additionally, this study examines how the affective quality, which refers to emotional responses to security safeguards, shapes threat and coping appraisals and, ultimately, personal security commitment. Drawing on stress and coping theory, we propose a model linking affective quality to threat appraisal, coping strategies, and commitment. A survey of 309 participants reveals that affective quality significantly influences both threat appraisal and coping appraisal, which in turn drive personal security commitment. Our findings contribute to research by extending stress and coping theory with an affective antecedent and introducing personal security commitment as a distinct construct. For practice, the results highlight how designing security technologies that evoke positive affective quality can foster stronger, more enduring security commitment.