Gender Differences in Identity-Based Social Influence a Proposed Experimental Examination of Software Piracy Behavior

Software piracy is the unauthorized copying, sharing, or using of software. It can be a profitable endeavor for individuals, but a tremendous loss for the industry. According to the Business Software Alliance, there is an annual revenue loss of over $52 billion in the industry (2016). Therefore, it is critical to understand as much as possible about the phenomenon, and investigate the factors that influence subjects' piracy behavior. Driven by gaps in previously published literature, the study proposed here is an experimental investigation into the gender differences in identity-based social influence. In essence, the study will examine if males or females are more likely to influence a group of their peers to either pirate, or abstain from pirating a piece of software. While this topic is previously unstudied in the field of software piracy, it could prove potentially useful in such areas as anti-piracy advertising. Further, as most of the published studies in software piracy are inclined to social desirability bias (as these studies traditionally rely on surveys and responses to paper-based scenarios), the study presented here has been designed with the specific objective of avoiding social desirability bias by having real money at stake in an experimental setting.