Integrating Social Capital Theory, Social Cognitive Theory, and the Technology Acceptance Model to Explore a Behavioral Model of Telehealth Systems

Abstract

Telehealth has become an increasingly applied solution to delivering health care to rural and underserved areas by remote health care professionals. This study integrated social capital theory, social cognitive theory, and the technology acceptance model (TAM) to develop a comprehensive behavioral model for analyzing the relationships among social capital factors (social capital theory), technological factors (TAM), and system self-efficacy (social cognitive theory) in telehealth. The proposed framework was validated with 365 respondents from Nantou County, located in Central Taiwan. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to assess the causal relationships that were hypothesized in the proposed model. The finding indicates that elderly residents generally reported positive perceptions toward the telehealth system. Generally, the findings show that social capital factors (social trust, institutional trust, and social participation) significantly positively affect the technological factors (perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness respectively), which influenced usage intention. This study also confirmed that system self-efficacy was the salient antecedent of perceived ease of use. In addition, regarding the samples, the proposed model fitted considerably well. The proposed integrative psychosocial-technological model may serve as a theoretical basis for future research and can also offer empirical foresight to practitioners and researchers in the health departments of governments, hospitals, and rural communities.

Telecare acceptance as sticky entrapment: A realist review

“…This support emerge from his study in Taiwan where TAM was integrated with social capital theory and cognitive theory, focusing on how different interacting factors affected users acceptance. TAM used alone did not reveal the factors that appeared significant for acceptance 10 .…”

“…Transparency in RR is delivered by explicitly documenting the judgements and inferences made throughout the review to allow readers to interpret the findings and make their own judgements 11 . Implementing telecare in health and care services is a complex intervention, as it produces different outcomes in different contexts 10,29 . When the context changes, the mechanisms (people, things, knowledge etc.)…”

“…They also critique TAM for excluding contexts. Tsai 10 supports the need for adding personal, contextual and social factors to TAM when assessing telecare acceptance with older people. This support emerge from his study in Taiwan where TAM was integrated with social capital theory and cognitive theory, focusing on how different interacting factors affected users acceptance.…”

“…Tsai 10 and Chen et al 7 emphasise that telecare should not be assessed isolated from the context in which it works. Telecare is often discussed in relation to older people, and thus many aspects relate to care in later life.…”

“…Researching telecare within the social sciences includes being attentive to context, which research indicates to be important in telecare 10 . Context is defined by Pawson to include the characteristics of i) the individual actors, ii) their interrelationships, iii) the institutional location, and iv) the surrounding infrastructure.…”