An Extended UTAUT Model to Explain Factors Influencing Smart City Technology Adoption

Abstract

This study examines determinants of smart city technologies adoption in the United Arab Emirates′ regional cities by extending the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). The pertinent literature has been thoroughly examined. Trust has been integrated as a central mediating construct, and personal innovativeness and financial cost were also added to the UTAUT original model. In addition, a cross-sectional survey of 224 IT professionals was used to collect quantitative data from the regional cities of UAE. The model under research was evaluated and confirmed using a structural equation modeling approach. Reliability and validity met conventional thresholds, and a bootstrapped mediation test was applied. The empirical research findings showed that performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, facilitating conditions, personal innovativeness, and financial cost each positively influence trust and trust in turn significantly predicts adoption attention. Further, the model explains 58.2% of the variance in trust and 27.9% in adoption intention. Besides, mediation analysis indicates that trust mediates the impacts of the six antecedents on adoption intention, highlighting trust as the principal mechanism translating into functional, social, and economic perception into adoption behavior. The findings also suggest that policymakers and government officials should prioritize trust-building measures, for instance, transparent data practices, clear value-for-money communication, and sustained user support and training alongside continued investments in enabling infrastructure. Finally, the study contributes an empirically by validating a trust-centered extension of UTAUT tailored to the government-led smart city context in emerging urban settings.