Abstract

As online use becomes commonplace in the digital environment, more and more people are indiscriminately copying, sharing, and reproducing online content. Thus, the government and institutions strengthen the level of punishment or take strong sanctions, but online piracy behavior is not reduced and becomes an ethically serious problem. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to empirically examine the effect of two common preventive methods, perceived morality and punishment, on self-control and piracy intention based on the deterrence theory. This study also attempts to investigate the mixed outcomes of gender differences to determine what preventive measures are gender-specific. The result of this study shows that the perceived morality directly effects on reducing online piracy intention while the perceived punishment effect on increasing self-control. The direct effect of punishment on reducing online piracy is moderated by online education. The gender differences vary the degree of morality by education and punishment. This study would provide both theoretical and practical implications emphasizing awareness and moral beliefs of online piracy and suggesting the awareness of gender differences in developing deterrence methods.

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