Factors Predicting Older People’s Acceptance of a Personalized Health Care Service App and the Effect of Chronic Disease: Cross-Sectional Questionnaire Study

Abstract

Background: Mobile health (mHealth) services enable real-time measurement of information on individuals’ biosignals and environmental risk factors; accordingly, research on health management using mHealth is being actively conducted. Objective: The study aims to identify the predictors of older people’s intention to use mHealth in South Korea and verify whether chronic disease moderates the effect of the identified predictors on behavioral intentions. Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire study was conducted among 500 participants aged 60 to 75 years. The research hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling, and indirect effects were verified through bootstrapping. Bootstrapping was performed 10,000 times, and the significance of the indirect effects was confirmed through the bias-corrected percentile method. Results: Of 477 participants, 278 (58.3%) had at least 1 chronic disease. Performance expectancy (β=.453; P=.003) and social influence (β=.693; P