What is the difference Thin Consent and Thick Consent?

Thin consent

If an employee receives formal notification that the company will be monitoring all email and web activity - either at the time of hire or during employment - and it is made clear in that notification that his or her continued employment with the company will be dependent on the employee's agreement to abide by that monitoring, then the employee may be said to have given 'thin' consent. In other Words, there are two options - agree to the monitoring or 'pursue other employment opportunities'.

- Thick consent

If employment conditions are at the other end of the scale - i.e. jobs are plentiful and the employee would have no difficulty in finding another position - then the consent given to the monitoring policy could be classified as 'thick' since the employee has a realistic alternative if he or she finds the policy to be unacceptable.

reference：Ghillyer, A.(2008). Business Ethics(2ed). New York:McGraw-Hill