Airline self-service technology adoption: Moderating impact of gender and experience

Harsandaldeep Kaur; Kaur, Parmeet Article Airline self-service technology adoption: Moderating impact of gender and experience Global Business & Finance Review (GBFR) Provided in Cooperation with: People & Global Business Association (P&GBA), Seoul Suggested Citation: Harsandaldeep Kaur; Kaur, Parmeet (2024) : Airline self-service technology adoption: Moderating impact of gender and experience, Global Business & Finance Review (GBFR), ISSN 2384-1648, People & Global Business Association (P&GBA), Seoul, Vol. 29, Iss. 5, pp. 1-13, https://doi.org/10.17549/gbfr.2024.29.5.1 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/305994 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your personal and scholarly purposes. You are not to copy documents for public or commercial purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ I. Introduction The significance of emerging technology in daily life cannot be overstated. Technology has revolutionized the way we live, work, play and travel. The widespread adoption of technology in almost every industry has Received: Jan. 5, 2024; Revised: Jan. 26, 2024; Accepted: Feb. 12, 2024 † Corresponding author: Parmeet Kaur E-mail: [email protected] now become a necessity (Lee et al., 2022; Islam, 2023). When it comes to using modern technology, the travel industry is no different in terms of adoption (Safaeimanesh et al., 2021). These days, technology is used by e-commerce companies in customer support, customer self-service and online services (Feng et al., 2018; Hwang 2022). A rapid increase in technology advancement specifically related to the internet has contributed towards the growth of airline industry by providing better services at lower GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW, Volume. 29 Issue. 5 (JUNE 2024), 1-13 pISSN 1088-6931 / eISSN 2384-1648 Https://doi.org/10.17549/gbfr.2024.29.5.∣1 ⓒ2024 People and Global Business Association GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW www.gbfrjournal.org for financial sustainability and people-centered global business1) A irline Self-Service Technology Adoption: Moderating Impact of Gender and Experience Harsandaldeep Kaur a , Parmeet Kaur b† aAssociate Professor, University School of Financial Studies, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab, India bResearch Scholar, University School of Financial Studies, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Punjab, India A B S T R A C T Purpose: The purpose of the paper is to examine the role of technology paradoxes, including technology anxiety, insecurity and forced usage, to understand consumer adoption behavior towards self-service technology. The present study also investigates the moderating effect of gender and experience on the relationship between paradoxes and adoption attitude towards self-service technology. Design/methodology/approach: In this study, a quantitative research approach was employed. We tested the research hypotheses using survey data collected from 249 users of self-service technology in the airline sector. Further, we tested the structural path relationship using SmartPLS-4. Findings: The findings have revealed the significant impacts of technology anxiety and insecurity on adoption attitude. The findings also reveal the partial moderating roles of gender and experience in the link between paradoxes and adoption attitude. Research limitations/implications: This study does not consider other factors influencing consumer adoption of self-service technology, such as ease of use, trust, and speed. The present study relies on cross sectional data to study consumer attitudes. Longitudinal research is required to examine consumer adoption attitudes towards technology in long run. Originality/value: The present study contributes to literature by investigating the role of paradoxes to understand consumer adoption attitudes and also determine the strategies that must be focused upon by service providers to enhance the experience of customers using self-service technology. Keywords: Self-service technology, Technology anxiety, Insecurity, Forced usage, Adoption attitude Copyright: The Author(s). This is an Open Access journal distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution ⓒ N on-Commercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution , and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW, Volume. 29 Issue. 5 (JUNE 2024), 1-13 2 costs (Islam, 2023). Self-service technology offers advantages for both customers and airlines (Cserdi & Kenesei, 2020). Self-service options offer economical and faster options for customers as compared to traditional service encounters (Castillo-Manzano & Lopez-Valpuesta, 2013) and reduce anxiety caused by critical service representatives (Cunningham et al., 2008). With respect to companies, these options have improved productivity and efficiency, led to reduced labor costs, and allowed the development of a competitive niche market (Castillo-Manzano & Lopez-Valpuesta, 2013; Yang et al., 2021). However, due to unique personality and assimilation variation, not all tourists are keen to adopt self-service technologies (Timmor & Katz-Navon, 2008). Numerous technological innovations are radical to customers and may cause them anxiety. This reluctant attitude towards SSTs adoption becomes a hurdle for companies' success (Gunasinghe & Nanayakkara, 2021). In this technological era, most organizations deliberately focus on the customer's experience towards the usage of technology (Kaushik & Rahman, 2015), while customers also evaluate the performance of technology by reacting in a positive or negative way (Johnson et al., 2008). Previous researchers have mainly focused on the motivators of technology adoption (Meuter et al., 2005; Safaeimanesh et al., 2021), but have ignored negative aspects such as paradoxes (an act or behavior that seems contradictory qualities), which need to be addressed in order to understand resistance behavior of customers (Johnson et al., 2008; Kleijnen et al., 2009). Tapping this gap, the present study examines the impact of paradoxes (technology anxiety, insecurity and forced usage) on technology adoption attitude. This is because if these contradictions are ignored, marketing tactics intended to increase satisfaction and loyalty towards self-service technology may be unsuccessful. Drawing from the theoretical perspective in the literature of psychology, the psychological reactance theory given by Brehm, (1966) states that when consumer experiences SSTs in a bondage situation, they will never believe in that technology, resulting in a doubtful attitude concerning the performance of self-service technology (Reinders et al., 2008). Based on this theory, we investigate the impact of forced usage on adoption attitude, which has rarely been studied in the literature. Since the context of this research is public transport services (that is airline sector), this could be useful for transport companies who are planning to carry out technology innovation for the first time (Cserdi & Kenesei, 2020). Further, based on theoretical perspective objective of this research, which is to explore psychological constructs such as technology anxiety and forced usage that have negative impact on consumer's attitude towards self-service technology. This has never been extensively discussed in previous literature so far. We emphasize these constructs to gain a better understanding of resistance attitude of consumers towards technology. Furthermore, the study acknowledges the impact of gender difference on adoption attitudes towards technology. There are numerous studies available in the literature which have reported that gender influences adoption behavior (Hsiao & Tang, 2015; Arifin et al., 2022). Meanwhile, little research has been conducted to find the role of gender on adoption of technology at airports. Accordingly, this research contributes towards the better understanding of how men and women distinguish self-service technology adoption in the context of a developing country. Further, this research explores the moderating impact of experience on relation between paradoxes and adoption attitude by applying multi-group analysis. The remainder of the paper is organized in the following manner. The first section includes an introduction, theoretical background and research hypotheses. The next section delineates the research methodology and results. Finally, the paper concludes with discussion of the results, including the implications and limitations of the study. Harsandaldeep Kaur, Parmeet Kaur 3 II. Literature Review A. Theoretical Background A technology's effectiveness depends on a user's readiness to adopt it. In addition, the success of novel technologies also depends on firm's ability to convince consumers regarding its benefits (Cserdi & Kenesei, 2020). However, restrictions in service delivery options develops resistance behavior which stimulate a negative mindset towards technology. Festinger, (1962) cognitive dissonance theory as a theoretical framework, posits that people experience contradictory beliefs, values or ideas after a stressful experience. This theory has been widely used in information technology research in order to describe reactions, with distinctions between pre and post services performance (Marikyan et al., 2020). With a positive experience, users appreciate the benefits of technology, and with a negative experience, they become anxious. This research holds significance as it identifies negative aspects such as technology paradoxes which have an adverse effect on firm's performance. Furthermore, the present study also draws upon technology readiness framework proposed by Parasuraman (2000) to understand the two technology inhibitors: technology anxiety and insecurity. Parasuraman's theoretical framework (TRI) has been used by the researchers to understand mental complexities while adopting self-service technology. The present study also draws from the psychological reactance theory given by Jack Brehm to describe the unwilling nature of users towards SSTs. This theory explains the unpleasant motivational reaction that eliminates specific behavioral freedom. Resistance behavior can be affected by psychological barriers (Kim & Bae, 2020). Moreover, negative association of technology anxiety and SST usage is an important psychological aspect which has been discussed in prior studies (Cobelli et al., 2021; Liu 2012). Technology anxiety further helps to explain the forced usage concept that we consider in our study. The psychological reactance theory suggests that users lose trust in technology when they are forced to use it, and this leads to performance ambiguity (Feng et al., 2018), which further develops negative attitudes towards technology. B. Adoption Attitude An attitude is defined as "a psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of favor or disfavor" (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993, p.1). It reflects the feeling of auspicious or inauspicious towards technology usage (Hsiao & Tang, 2015). Attitude helps in evaluating objects, people, activities, events, environment or ideas either in positive or negative way (Kaushik et al., 2015). It becomes very difficult to evaluate the attitude of customers towards technology which is erratic with advancement in technology (Curran et al., 2003). On the basis of the above discussion, the present study has determined that the following constructs have adverse impacts on consumer attitudes. C. Development of Research Hypotheses 1. Technology Anxiety and Adoption Attitude The concept of technology anxiety is acquired from the computer anxiety literature (Tsai et al. 2020). Technology anxiety is one of the most influential factor that affects a consumer's decision to use or not to use SSTs (Cobelli et al., 2021; Liu, 2012). Technology anxiety is defined as complex emotions such as fear, nervousness and insecurity associated with technology usage (Troisi et al., 2022). Innovation research demonstrates that initial trial of something new develops strong emotions, and anxiety is part of this (Evanschitzky et al., 2015). In a study of the e-learning environment, Gunasinghe & Nanayakkara (2021) reported the negative influence of technology anxiety on adoption attitude. Prior literature provides more evidence that fearful emotions towards technology create anxiety, resulting in negative attitudes (Cobelli et al., 2021). Based on previous GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW, Volume. 29 Issue. 5 (JUNE 2024), 1-13 4 arguments, we also anticipate that technology anxiety will negatively influence adoption attitude and hypothesize as below. H1: Technology anxiety has negative impact on user's adoption attitude towards SSTs. 2. Insecurity and Adoption Attitude Insecurity reflects the customer's "distrust of technology and skepticism about its ability to work properly" (Parasuraman, 2000). Insecurity is a negative feeling that triggers the negative attitude of a potential adopter (Kaushik et al., 2015). Because of this unfavorable attitude, consumers might distance themselves from technology because they assume that the innovation might be harmful for them (Kleijnen et al., 2009). In support to above, Mandina & Matsikain (2021) found insecurity to be key factor in predicting negative attitudes in the self-service life insurance context. Also, in the context of self-service bag drop technology, consumers with feelings of risk and fear are less likely to explore innovation resulted in negative attitude (Park et al., 2021). Hence, based on previous studies, it has been concluded that insecurity strongly predicts the resistance attitude of consumer towards technology. Therefore, we propose: H2: Insecurity has a negative impact on a user's adoption attitude towards SSTs. 3. Forced Usage and Adoption Attitude Forced usage means that customers have no other options other than on-site SSTs to choose service delivery mode (Reinders et al., 2008; Liu, 2012). Complete replacement of staff interaction with SSTs can lead to resistance behavior lead to negative outcomes (Feng et al., 2018). According to psychological reactance theory, when a consumer feels a loss of freedom, they become more interested in interacting with frontline employees and less interested in using SST. This results in negative attitude towards technology which leads to performance ambiguity (Johnson et al., 2008). Similarly, when the service provider forces the customer to use SST, this may make the customer feel exploited and develop negative feelings towards SSTs (Reinder et al., 2008; Liu, 2012). Thus, we propose a hypothesis based on theoretical background that suggests negative relation between forced usage and customer attitude. H3: Forced usage has negative impact on user's adoption attitude towards SSTs. 4. Moderating Effect of Gender In the technology adoption context, gender differences have attracted the attention of researchers over the decades. Numerous studies in the literature have put emphasis on gender differences in technology adoption (Baker et al., 2007; Hsiao & Tang, 2015). Amin (2006) claimed that male customers have more positive attitudes towards technology than females in the banking SMS context. Na et al., (2021) argued that males are more open towards new innovations. Males have also found to have more favorable attitudes towards e-commerce than females (Pijpers et al., 2001), who are more conscious about the security aspects (Amin et al., 2006). Based on the above discussion, we propose the following hypotheses: H4: Gender has a significant moderating role in the relationship between technology anxiety and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for female customers than for male customers. H5: Gender has a significant moderating role in the relationship between insecurity and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for female customers than for male customers. H6: Gender has a significant moderating role in the relationship between forced usage and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for female customers than for male customers. Harsandaldeep Kaur, Parmeet Kaur 5 5. Moderating Effect of Experience According to Schmitt (1999) experience is defined as "sensory, emotional, cognitive, behavioral and relational values that replace functional ones". In simple words, people's engagement with the services over a longer period of time leads to the development of experience (Pine & Gilmore, 1998). As customer experience using technology increases, there is reduction in insecurity towards technology (O' Cass Fenech, 2003). Previous studies in e-commerce have indicated that the past experience motivates and influence the individual to adopt technology (Kwak et al., 2002; Tripathi, 2018). Therefore, experience acts as an important moderator in technology context because experience may change the preferences of users over time (Alshehri et al., 2020). More experience towards self-service technology develops favorable attitude towards it which further helps to set off the outcomes related to forced usage (Curran et al., 2003). Drawing from the discussion above, it is proposed that experience acts as an important moderator, with the potential to modify the relations in the research model (see Figure 1). Therefore, we postulate the following hypotheses: H7: Experience has a significant moderating role in the relationship between technology anxiety and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for less experienced than more experienced customers. H8: Experience has a significant moderating role in the relationship between insecurity and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for less experienced than more experienced customers. H9: Experience has a significant moderating role in the relationship between forced usage and adoption attitude. Specifically, the relationship will be stronger for less experienced than more experienced customers. III. Methods A. Choice of Industry India's aviation industry is one of its fastest growing. It is expected that in the year 2024, it will be the 3 rd largest aviation industry in the world (Civil Aviation, 2023). In the modern era, demand for self-service technology has increased tremendously, and about 80% of airlines worldwide have focused on investing in technological equipment (Gures et al., 2018). Thus, the present study has been conducted on the aviation sector. B. Structure of Questionnaire and Data Collection The present research used self-administered questionnaire to collect data. Convenience sampling was used for data collection. The study's sample consisted of business class travelers, who travel often. Business travelers prefer self-check-in over leisure travelers in order to save time (Wittmer 2011). The questionnaire had two sections. The first section included demographics related to gender, age, Figure 1. Conceptual model GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW, Volume. 29 Issue. 5 (JUNE 2024), 1-13 6 qualification and experience, and the second section was related to four constructs, namely technology anxiety, insecurity, forced usage and adoption attitude. In this study we employed 7-point Likert scale as a survey instrument ranging from 1 (Completely disagree) to 7 (Completely agree). We defined the dependent and independent variables by considering the previous literature. Table 1 shows the measures of constructs used in our study. The data was collected from 300 respondents out of them, 249 valid responses were obtained, which is an acceptable sample as per Wittmer, 2011 in transport research. The questionnaire was distributed to those respondents who had experience of buying ticket and collecting boarding pass using either one or all the mentioned ways such as airline websites, mobile apps and self-service kiosks at airports. Detail description of sample is in Table 2. Construct Indicators Technology anxiety Meuter et al., (2005); Reinders et al., (2008); Lee et al., (2012) TA1: I avoided the technology because of unfamiliarity. TA2: I feel nervous to use technology because of making mistakes. TA3: I fear that I might damage it in some way. TA4: Technical/ difficult terms on system confuse me. TA5: I rarely/seldom use technology related services. Insecurity Meuter & Bitner (1998); Lee et al., (2012); Kaushik & Rahman, (2015) INS1: I do not feel secure while providing personal information over Kiosks/websites/apps. INS2: I feel worried that information seen by others. INS3: I do not feel safe to provide credit/debit card number over computer. INS4: I do not feel confident doing transactions using self-service technology. INS5: I feel trouble if something go wrong while using self-service technology. Forced usage Reinder et al., (2008); Liu, (2012) FU1: When I need services only self-services facilities are available. FU2: I have less freedom to choose a service delivery mode. FU3: Service provider forced me to use Self-Service technology. FU4: No choice of interaction with service employees is available. Adoption Attitude Kaushik et al., (2015); Hsiao & Tang, (2015) ADATT1: I feel that using self-service technology is good idea. ADATT2: I have positive perception of using self-service technology. ADATT3: I like to use self-service technology. ADATT4: I intend to use self-service technology in future. ADATT5: I would recommend my friends/ relatives to use self-service technology. Table 1. Variables and indicators Gender Count Percentage% Qualification Count Percentage% Male 111 44.6 Primary education 4 1.6 Female 138 55.4 High School 6 2.4 249 100 Bachelor Degree 83 33.3 Postgraduate Degree 156 62.7 249 100 Table 2. Demographic characteristic Harsandaldeep Kaur, Parmeet Kaur 7 IV. Results A. Data Analysis SmartPLS-4 software was used for analysis purpose (Ringle et al., 2015). Further multi-group analysis was performed to find the effects of gender and experience as moderators. Before applying multi-group analysis, there is requirement to establish measurement invariance; for that purpose, the MICOM (Measurement invariance for composite) approach was used (Rasoolimanesh et al., 2017). 1. Common Method Bias For evaluating common method biasness, the values of variance inflation factor (VIF) inner model were assessed through PLS-SEM. In the present study, all the values of VIF are below 3.33 (ref. table 3), which suggests the absence of common method biasness (Hair et. al., 2011; Kock, 2015; Islam, 2023). 2. Measurement Model Using SmartPLS4 software, we evaluated the validity of constructs in proposed model. Initially we validate the model for whole sample (249 cases), then Multi-group partial least square analysis was run to make comparison between groups such as: males, females, high and low experience. Table 3 shows the Cronbach's Alpha ( ), composite reliability α (rho_a) of all constructs which is above the recommended cut off value of 0.7, thus indicate good reliability (Hair et al. 2010). Convergent validity was measured through the values of AVE (Average Variance Extracted), which is well above the threshold limit of 0.5 (Hair et al., 2016). So we confirm convergent validity. According to Henseler et al., (2015), Heterotrait-Monotrait (HTMT) criterion is more reliable as compared to Fornell and Larcker criterion in PLS-SEM. Therefore, this study applies HTMT criterion (see Table 3). All HTMT values of constructs were observed to be below the limit 0.90, which confirms the discriminant validity under study (Hair et al., 2020). 3. Measuring Invariance of Composites (MICOM) The moderating impact of gender and experience of the customer on the conceptual model was examined through PLS multi-group analysis. Multigroup analysis can be run only if the 2 out of 3 conditions of MICOM (measuring invariance of composites) are successful. So, according to Henseler et al., (2016) testing for composites the MICOM process involves three steps: configural invariance, compositional invariance, and mean and variance invariance. Table 4 shows the results of MICOM to fulfill the pre-requirements of multi-group analysis. The initial step of configural invariance was satisfied by asserting the fact that same constructs, same algorithm and similar scale was applied for males, females and experience. Further, second step compositional invariance was established through permutation, and the correlation was observed to fall under the acceptance region of confidence intervals at 5%. Last step of mean and variance difference was not fulfilled under the study. Therefore, partial invariance was established, and we justify the two conditions for application of multi-group analysis Age Experience 18-25 18 7.2 Last six months 71 28.5 26-35 118 47.4 Six months to one year 81 32.5 36-45 90 36.1 One to two years 36 14.5 Above 45 23 9.2 More than two Years 61 24.5 249 100 249 100 Table 2. Continued GLOBAL BUSINESS & FINANCE REVIEW, Volume. 29 Issue. 5 (JUNE 2024), 1-13 8 by MICOM (Henseler et al., 2016). 4. Structural Model After confirming reliability and validity, we accessed the structural model outcomes. Table 5 shows the path coefficients resulting from running bootstrapping procedure with 249 cases and 5000 sub samples. Out of three, two hypotheses (H1, H2) were confirmed by bootstrapping, and one hypotheses (H3) was rejected. Results show negative impact of technology anxiety, insecurity (H1, H2) on adoption attitude with the P-value less than 0.05. Further, forced usage was found to have insignificant relation with adoption attitude, with a P-value above 0.05. To investigate the moderating effect of gender, multi group analysis was run using PLS-4. Table 6 shows the moderating effect and indicated that Constructs Configural invariance Compositional invariance (Gender) Compositional invariance (Experience) Partial measurement invariance established Technology Anxiety Yes 0.995 0.997 Yes Insecurity Yes 0.995 0.995 Yes Forced Usage Yes 0.994 0.990 Yes Adoption Attitude Yes 0.998 0.999 Yes Table 4. Results of invariance measurement testing using permutation (Gender and Experience) Paths βSD T-values P-values Result TA->ADATT -0.398 0.085 0.096 0.000 S INS->ADATT -0.221 0.084 2.629 0.009 S FU-> ADATT -0.008 0.087 4.668 0.924 NS N otes: - Original Sample; S.D. denotes standard deviations; t-values signifies critical ratio, TA-Technology anxiety, INSInsecurity, FUβ Forced usage, ADATTAdoption attitude; NS-Not Supported; SSupported Table 5. Results of hypotheses testing (Complete) Constructs Construct Reliability and Validity Discriminant validity Common Method Biasness αrho_a AVE ADATT FU INS TA VIF Adoption Attitude (ADATT) 0.868 0.875 0.654 - Forced Usage (FU) 0.865 0.874 0.711 0.352 1.431 Insecurity (INS) 0.916 0.936 0.748 0.563 0.608 2.398 Technology Anxiety (TA) 0.888 0.893 0.691 0.630 0.528 0.799 2.156 Table 3. Measurement Model Paths Male Female ()βSD T-values P-values Result ( )βSD T-values P-values Result FU->ADATT -0.059 0.122 0.488 0.626 NS 0.114 0.083 1.366 0.172 NS INS->ADATT -0.150 0.118 1.271 0.204 NS -0.228 0.111 2.058 0.040 S TA-> ADATT -0.330 0.117 2.833 0.005 S -0.568 0.103 5.542 0.000 S Table 6. Results of hypotheses testing (Gender)