Wiebe, E. N., E. Shaver, & M. S. Wogalter.  (October, 2001).  Peoples' beliefs about the Internet: Surveying positive and negative aspects. Presented at the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting. Minneapolis, MN.

Abstract
The explosion of the Internet -- and the World Wide Web (WWW) in particular -- has led to the distribution of information to a much more diverse and unspecified audience.  Human factors professionals have a stake in the design of these Internet-based tools and the delivery of information over them. A questionnaire distributed to a large diverse population asked the respondents to provide positive and negative aspects about the WWW and related Internet communication technologies.  The responses were grouped according to more general positive and negative aspect categories.  Most of the categories paralleled each other on the negative and positive side.  Both negative and positive aspects of the access to information dominated the responses, along with concerns over security.  These issues, plus others mentioned in the responses, are ones that human factors professionals are in a position to address.