User acceptance of WAP services: test of competing theories

Although wireless application protocol (WAP) service acceptance has long attracted considerable interest, the problem of identifying the best theoretical model among the various prevalent models has been relatively neglected. Recently, a few studies have attempted to examine this issue using the decomposed TPB model. It is rare for one model to be superior to all of the other models in all criteria. WAP service acceptance involves competition among three well-established theoretical models, as follows: the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), and the decomposed TPB model. This study compares the effectiveness of these three models in understanding WAP services acceptance. Empirical data were obtained from a field survey in Taiwan. Notable findings were reported for the three competing models, as follows: (1) TPB and decomposed TPB are superior to TAM in terms of their ability to explain user acceptance of WAP services and (2) while the decomposed TPB model provided more easily understood and managerially relevant factors, the TPB model was more parsimonious and had very similar explanatory power to the decomposed TPB model. Finally, the implications of this study are discussed.