earticle

영어

In order to reduce the spread of illegal digital contents, many studies have been focusing on how to stop it through laws and regulations. Only few of the studies tried to explain the illegal behaviors from individual‘s viewpoints. This paper aims to examine the intention of sharing illegal digital contents over the Internet and proposes a theoretical model based on the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) along with the introduction of two outcome expectations. We also argue that the individuals’ cognition of online copyright will influence individuals’ illegal contents sharing on the Internet. We have collected data from online survey and offline interview. By empirical study, the results support the theoretical model except the subjective norm which has no effect on individuals’ behavior. This is a different finding from the previous researches revealing that the subjective norm has no effect on individuals’ unethical actions. Overall, the findings provide strong confirmation that attitude, self-efficacy and outcome expectations impact on individual’s intention of sharing illegal contents. In addition, this study proposed an improved cognition of online copyright through education and standard of new media management will reduce illegal contents sharing on Internet.