Determinants of Consumer Acceptance of Mobile Internet: An Empirical Study

The Internet and mobile technology, the two most dynamic technological forces in modern information and communication technologies are converging into one ubiquitous mobile Internet service, which will change our way of both doing business and dealing with our daily routine activities. There is no doubt that the mobile Internet service is moving toward the new generation on which enables mobile users to enjoy a variety of new and upgraded multimedia mobile services. This study composes a new hybrid theoretical framework to identify the factors affecting the acceptance and use of mobile Internet in a consumer context. The proposed model incorporates eight constructs: performance expectancy, effort expectancy, facilitating conditions, social influences, perceived value, perceived playfulness, attention focus, and behavioral intention. Individual differences -namely, age, gender, and experience- are hypothesized to moderate the effects of behavioral intention towards the use of mobile Internet. It was found that performance expectancy and perceived playfulness have the strongest significant effect on the behavioral intentions towards the use of mobile Internet. The findings of this study provide several crucial implications for mobile Internet service providers, practitioners, consumers and researchers.