Social media usage by elderly: application of technology acceptance model

Abstract

Although social media usage grows every day, we do not know with certainty the use that the senior citizens give to them, nor the factors that influence its use. This research is intended to apply an adaptation of the technology acceptance model (TAM) in elderly citizens to assess what influences their actual use of social media if they indeed use it.  For this purpose, 300 adults over 60 participated in Cuenca, Ecuador. Through a survey we tried to find out the perceived usefulness, the perceived ease of use, the attitude toward using social networks, the behavioral intention to use social media, and the actual usage that elderly give to social media. The findings of the study show that the perceived ease of use does not influence the behavioral intention to use social media by the elderly, but rather it is the perceived usefulness of the network and its contents what have a positive and significant effect on social media usage by senior citizens.