Behavioural Research Lab Seminar: Gerard P Hodgkinson and Siddharth Gulati

This Behavioural Research Lab seminar —"Explicating the socio-cognitive foundations of work-related phishing attacks and their attendant remedies: A (modified) dual-process framework" —will be hosted by Professor Gerard P Hodgkinson, Professor of Strategic Management and Behavioural Science, and Doctor Siddharth Gulati, Research Associate. An online option is also available, if you would like to join online please contact [email protected].

This article advances a framework for analysing the socio-cognitive dynamics of work-related phishing attacks. Building on recent developments in the cognitive and affective sciences, the article integrates the insights of default-interventionist and parallel-competitive dual-process theories of judgment, decision making, and social cognition to develop a novel account of the manner in which cyber criminals attempt to launch successful attacks. Specifically, the framework differentiates four sets of mechanisms—Type 1(a) cold automatic, Type 1(b) hot automatic, Type 2(a) cold controlled, and (Type 2(b) hot controlled cognitive processes—which cyber criminals adopt, variously, both in isolation and in a dynamic interplay, in their efforts to induce employees to succumb to their requests. The article challenges the notion that susceptibility to phishing attacks arises predominantly from lapses in systematic thinking, emphasizing instead the complex interaction between emotion and cognition afforded by each of these distinctive mechanisms and considers the attendant implications for enhancing organizational defences against such attacks. It concludes with an agenda for advancing the science and practice of cyber security in this rapidly evolving domain.

Host or Publisher Behavioural Research Laboratory