Developing a General Extended Technology Acceptance Model for E-Learning (GETAMEL) by analysing commonly used external factors

“The selection of external variables comprised subjective norms, computer self-e ffi cacy, and facilitating conditions — three of the most prominent predictors of PEU and PU (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Baydas & Goktas, 2017).”

“Based on the literature study conducted by Abdullah and Ward (2016), the five most used external factors by researchers and confirmed to have a relationship with TAM in the context of e-learning are self-efficacy, subjective norm, enjoyment, computer anxiety, and prior experience. According to the review study conduct…”

“The findings from this study confirm previous literature saying that students who are confident in applying a variety of self-regulated strategies are more likely to accomplish their academic tasks ( Abdullah & Ward, 2016 ; Alghamdi et al., 2020 ).”

“Abdullah and Ward (2016) also investigated factors influencing e-learning acceptance using TAM.”

“Based on extensive literature review on extended TAM in the context of e-learning, and in accordance with the GETAMEL developed by Abdullah and Ward (2016) (shown in figure 2), this study proposed the following research hypotheses: Hypothesis 1: SE positively affects students' PEOU of the…”

“The importance of SE as a key determinant of PU and PEU in the educational field is well-established in the literature of technology adoption (Chahal & Rani, 2022; Abdullah et al., 2016 ).”

“Although Abdullah and Ward [24] achieved significant results by determining the most frequent factors affecting the e-learning adoption (i.”

“The prior studies found that experience positively impacted users’ perceived ease of use toward e-learning usage (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Armenteros et al., 2013; Chang et al., 2017; De Smet et al., 2012; Lee et al., 2011; Tarhini et al., 2015).”

“…& Devedžić, 2021 ; Granić & Marangunić, 2019; Kemp, Palmer & Strelan, 2019; Scherer et al., 2019; Al-Emran, Mezhuyev & Kam-aludin, 2018; Abdullah & Ward,2016), while just few publications addressed other acceptance models and theories, in particular Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use…”

“Other studies have also confirmed the significant effect of perceived ease of use on perceived usefulness (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Alalwan et al., 2017; Baabdullah et al., 2016; Calisir & Calisir, 2004; Gefen & Straub, 2000; Susanto & Aljoza, 2015; Tobbin, 2010).”

“Following the GETAMEL [38], Enjoyment (ENJ) is understood as the extent to which the activity of applying any system is perceived to be enjoyable, regardless of the consequences of this system’s usage.”

“Additionally, Abdullah and Ward (2016) completed a meta-analysis using the TAM to better understand the adoption of e-learning, or tools that utilize online technologies for instructional purposes.”

“However, external factors that influence perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use may change, such as social influence, anxiety, facilitating conditions, self-satis-faction, self-efficacy, cost tolerance, perceived enjoyment, experience and so on [1].”

“However, it is also important to understand how external variables affect the PEOU and PU [26].”

“PENJ is another relatively new construct incorporated by Abdullah and Ward (2016) in the General Extended Technology Acceptance Model for E-Learning (GETAMEL).”

“In addition, the easier it is to use the gamified training platform, the greater the user’s intentions to use gamification for training [43].”

“Self-Determination Theory (SDT) involves self-efficacy, a similar concept to perceived competence [32] and one of the most used predictors of motivational models for e-learning [33].”

“To fill this gap, Abdullah and Ward [47] developed the GETAMEL (General Extended Technology Acceptance Model for E-Learning), where they elaborated on the external factors and distinguished the following indicators: Experience, Subjective Norms, Enjoyment, Computer Anxiety, and Self-Efficacy.”

“Apart from the aforementioned models, other technology acceptance and Elearning quality models have been developed with an emphasis on usefulness and ease of use [8, 35].”

“Education and e-learning have been the subject of several studies, e.g., modeling e-learning systems’ adoption (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Chen & Liu, 2013; Tarhini, Hone, Liu, & Tarhini, 2016), satisfaction (Aggelidis & Chatzoglou, 2012; Kassim, Jailani, Hairuddin, & Zamzuri, 2012), and success (Wang,…”

“TAM posits that the perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) of a technology are key determinants of its acceptance and use (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Davis, 1989).”

“Earlier studies, according to Abdullah and Ward [84,85], found that PE had a substantial impact on the PEOU and PU for e-learning.”

“Under these conditions, e-learning scholars anticipated that more studies have to be carried out to understand the determinants that affect e-learning adoption (Abdullah and Ward 2016; Salloum et al. 2019).”

“These results are consistent partially with the results of previous meta-analyses conducted with the aim of discovering the most common external factors used to extend TAM in studies that examine e-learning adoption (Abdullah et al., 2016; Abdullah & Ward, 2016).”

“Previous research has indicated that self-efficacy is an important antecedent of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, affecting individuals’ technology adoption behavior (Abdullah et al., 2016; Altalhi, 2021).”

“Factors, such as SE, subjective norm, enjoyment, computer anxiety, and experience often shape students’ PEOU, and PU, particularly in e-learning contexts [80].”

“To date, a wide range of factors have been reported in empirical research conducted under the framework of technology acceptance (Abdullah & Ward, 2016).”

“Abdullah and Ward (2016) conducted a meta-analysis study and found that subjective norm, experience, perceived enjoyment, computer anxiety and self-efficacy were the most commonly used external factors for TAM.”

“TAM has also been applied and empirically supported in the prediction of the adoption of E-commerce [46], mobile marketing [54], mobile wallets [55], e-learning [56]; mobile banking [57], Big Data [58], business-related technologies [59] and much other information.”

“CA is a phenomenon that has been widely researched since the start of the Digital Revolution in the 1980s and is still important today [50,51].”

“It is a common interest among academics who develop TAM extensions, to comprehend the relationships existing between external variables and TAM’s two main determinants PU and PEOU [6].”

“Subjective norms, behavioral intention, and continuance behavior Subjective norms (SN) refer to the extent to which people feel pressure from others (family, friends, and colleagues) of their community who are important to them to act in a certain way (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Ham et al., 2015).”

“…model in fields such as e-government (Alryalat, 2017; Dahi & Ezziane, 2015; Ma & Zheng, 2018; Mensah, Vera, & Mi, 2018; Sebetci, 2015), e-learning (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Gamble, 2018; Mohammadi, 2015), e-health (Chauhan & Jaiswal, 2017; de Veer et al., 2015; Hoque, Bao, & Sorwar, 2017; Hossain,…”

“In the late 1990s, such educational courses came to be hosted on internal networks, and after that they were put on learning management systems (LMSs) in the late 1990s (Abdullah and Ward, 2016; Hubackova, 2015).”

“Yu and Yu [42] developed a theoretical framework based on TPB to investigate factors inducing student online learning utilization.”

“The more experience users have, the easier the use of technology will be (Abdullah and Ward 2016; Davis 1989; Maldonado et al. 2009; Thongsri et al. 2018).”

“Diverse theoretical models have been proposed to account for a user's fi nal acceptance behavior (Lee, Kozar, & Larsen, 2003) and TAM has been extended in numerous ways over the years (e.g., Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Mohammadi, 2015; Ros et al., 2015).”

“In addition, the literature also reveals individuals are somewhat reluctant to accept and subsequently use this technology (Rym et al. 2013; Abdullah and Ward 2016).”

“Abdullah and Ward (2016) reported on seven studies that investigated the effects of losing perceived usefulness, and two of these studies found that ANX had a significant effect on PU, but not others.”

“Conversely, use perception which may be resulting from the effortless use of mobile learning, could also be attributed from having high mobile learning self-efficacy [46], [78], [83].”

“Abdullah et al. discovered Self-Efficacy (SE) as the most usual external factor used in the TAM model (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Keikhosrokiani, 2019; Keikhosrokiani et al., 2019).”

“In the e-learning context, Abdullah and Ward (2016) pointed out that factor enjoyment has positive influences on perceived ease to use and perceived usefulness.”

“Abdullah and Ward’s (2016) study revealed that self-efficacy, subjective norm, enjoyment, computer anxiety, and experience were the most frequently used external factors affecting perceived usefulness and the perceived ease of use.”

“The research on computer anxiety is a concept that has been largely studied after the beginning of the Digital Revolution in the 1980s and is still applicable nowadays [37, 49, 50].”

“Similarly, computer self-efficacy and perception of external control play a positive effect upon the perceived ease of use (Abdullah and Ward, 2016).”

“Strong evidence supported the important role that PEU play in predicting the BI (Davis, 1989; Igbaria et al., 1997; Tarhini, Hone, & Liu, 2014a; Masa’deh et al., 2015; Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Esterhuyse & Scholtz, 2016).”

“[49], Abdullah and Ward [183],”

“Previous studies utilized the TAM to examine factors related but not limited to experience, perceived usefulness, technology anxiety, and technology self-efficacy (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Chang et al., 2017).”

“This step could improve students’ PEU because improvements will be made based on their input (Abdullah et al., 2016).”

“Therefore, our proposed model is in line with Davis (1986), Davis et al. (1989), Venkatesh and Morris (2000), Moon and Kim (2001), Chen et al. (2012), and Abdullah and Ward (2016) who suggested the TAM has the robust and well explanation for behavior intention toward the information system.”

“In the context of the information system, the D&M model and TAM are the most popular models used to explain the adoption and success of information systems in education (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Almaiah, 2018; Almaiah et al., 2016, 2020).”

“The result does not concur with previous studies (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Aburub & Alnawas, 2019; Li et al., 2019), where computer anxiety was found to have a negative relationship with perceived ease of use.”

“Sometimes its complexity is disapproved due to the confusing nature of some items and to the low impact on the overall performance of the outputs compared to UTAUT (Abdullah & Ward, 2016).”

“…in the literature, several recent reviews suggest that there is neither a unique formulation of these models for each type of technological use, nor a consensus on the importance of the main constructs that they propose (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Grani´c & Maranguni´c, 2019; Scherer et al., 2019).”

“In a review of 107 studies that added external variables to the basic TAM and proposed new models, Abdullah and Ward (2016) found five excessively and commonly used variables for the extension – self-efficacy, subjective norm, perceived enjoyment, computer anxiety, and computer use experience.”

“It is clear that, compared with the acceptance of technological innovation, organizations ’ innovation climate is significantly and positively related to innovative teaching using ICT (Abdullah & Ward, 2016; Lau & Yuen, 2014; Obiri-Yeboah, Kwarteng, & Kyere-Djan, 2013; Wang et al., 2014).”

“…study the players acceptance of social network games (Park et al., 2014), adoption of mobile cloud service (Park and Kim, 2014) and huge number of researches have been adopted TAM for e-learning acceptance (Abdullah and Ward, 2016; Chang et al., 2017; Ratna and Mehra, 2015; Tarhini et al., 2017).”

“…model proved appropriate, though studies have found no signi fi cant psychological differences in student satisfaction and acceptance of online learning, research tables clarify that TAM is affected by factors such as self-ef fi - cacy, enjoyment behaviors, and anxiety (Abdullah & Ward, 2016).”