Assessing user acceptance toward blog technology using the UTAUT model

Blogs are among the many commonly used technologies for education and learning. They are also both conversational technologies and constructivist learning tools. Their interactive, collaborative, user-friendly, and instant archival features have transformed blogs into effective tools for enhancing case-based teaching methods in the asynchronous nature of the online environment. This study investigated the student populace’s acceptance of the blog technology through the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) framework. UTAUT integrates eight theories from social psychology and sociology in order to examine the effects of major factors on behavioral intention and actual use of blog to learn e-business course materials and topic discussions. The results showed that both social influence and performance expectancy had a significant relationship with behavioral intention, whereas effort expectancy did not. In this study, behavioral intention did not have a significant relationship with actual usage level of blogs as a learning tool.