Continued use of e-government services: an expectation confirmation theory and trust theory approach
Date
2017
Authors
Mutale, Daniel Gerald
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Abstract
The present study is part of a larger project which centers on smart cities. The current study focuses on Gauteng residents’ electronic service post-adoption behaviour. Through interconnected structures, a city is defined as smart if investment in technology infrastructure and human capital result in sustainable growth and improves the quality of life of its residents.
Residents’ post-adoption behaviours have emerged as one of the key areas of study in information systems research. The long-term viability of a new technology, however, depends on a resident’s continued use behaviour rather than on their initial acceptance decisions. Prior research on continued use is neither clear about acceptance and continued use behaviour nor on the theoretical underpinnings. Research suggests that there may have been an insufficient understanding of the continued use phenomenon that has led to misapplications of theories resulting in the potential generation of spurious correlations. This study uses the e-government context as an instance of an electronic service through which the continued use phenomenon is explored.
Governments in developing countries are being challenged in their engagement and retention of residents’ continuous use of e-government services. This is because after initial use of the egovernment service, a majority of residents revert to traditional methods such as the telephone or face to face to obtain the service. The continued use among residents of e-government services is therefore pivotal to the success of resident focused e-government initiatives and their long term viability. This study follows in the footsteps of developing countries in studying e-government services where continued use intention rather than intention to use is the dependent variable.
Drawing from Expectation Confirmation theory (ECT) and Trust theory, the current study aims to determine, understand and explain the effects of factors such as satisfaction and distrust on egovernment service continued use intention. The aim is to explore how the variables from ECT and Trust interact to provide a better explanation on how individuals arrive to a continued usage state. Trust may interact with an individual’s perceived performance and satisfaction from ECT. A model is derived and hypotheses are stated and tested. A quantitative research approach is used in this study.
The present study uses a cross sectional design. Data was collected through surveys from 203 residents from the City of Ekurhuleni. This city is one of the most prominent cities within South Africa that is progressing towards becoming a smart city. Ekurhuleni provides residents with numerous e-government services such as the capability to pay for municipal bills and to report infrastructure issues, and an open data portal with diverse statistics on the city.
The model explained 36% of the variance in continued use intention. From the research it emerges that Hypothesis 7c trust in city e-services positively influences continued use intention was the most significant hypothesis. Contributions to research and practice are given, followed by areas of future research.
The findings from this study will enhance our understanding of the extent to which the continued use intention of a technology is determined by the interaction between expectation and trust factors, and their impact on continued use intention.
Description
A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Commerce by research (Information Systems), School of Economic and Business Sciences University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2017
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Citation
Mutale, Daniel Gerald Tapiwa, (2017) Continued use of e-government services: an expectation confirmation theory and trust theory approach, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, https://hdl.handle.net/10539/27020