Special Issue: Dark Sides of Digitalization

Abstract

The digitalization of individuals (i.e., the proliferation of digital technologies in the lives of individual users), organizations (i.e., digitalization of work and the business environment), and societies (i.e., the digital economy) has been enabled by digital technologies such as smartphones, social media, cloud-based systems, robots, and artificial intelligence. The adoption and use of these technologies have increasingly reshaped human’s perceptions, actions, and environments and have been associated with a myriad of benefits for individuals, organizations, and societies (e.g., connectivity, enhanced decision-making, increased productivity, and economic growth) [6, 8, 17]. Despite the conspicuous benefits, digitalization has been a revolution. Different from prior revolutions, such as the industrial revolution, or revolution in transportation (e.g., as manifested in changes in speeds of trains and cars), it has been aggressive, fast moving and status quo shattering. Just over the last 40 years, personal computers have increased in storage volume and processing speeds by huge magnitudes. Like other revolutions, though, the rise of digital technologies has started revealing a number of “dark sides” with grave impacts at the individual, organizational, and societal levels [53]. While the bright sides of digitalization have received considerable scholarly attention, the literature on the dark sides of digitalization is in its early stages and in need of further research [48]. This special issue sought to add to the bodies of work that gradually mitigate this gap. At the individual level, the research on the dark side of digitalization engages with investigating its negative consequences and the side effects of using utilitarian and hedonic information technology (IT) artifacts for individual users. It acknowledges the existence of “bright sides” of IT but still strives to understand and find ways to mitigate negative, or “dark side” effects of IT on individuals, firms, and societies. So far, notable findings in this area have shed light on technology addiction [34, 46], problematic use of IT [46], technostress [4, 41, 42], general stress [45, 54], experience of ambivalence [33], negative health outcomes [40], security and privacy concerns [12, 14], online deviant behaviors such as cyberbullying [22, 23, 56], and the dark side of user-generated content [20, 32]. Adverse effects of digitalization of individuals can impact everyone, from children [11] and youth