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Top1. Introduction
With the rapid development of internet technology, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things, human beings are ruthlessly pursuing intelligence and convenience, and the efficiency of information services is receiving increasing attention. In this case, traditional e-government has been unable to effectively meet the demands of citizens; thus, mobile government is developing rapidly as a branch of the development of e-government. In the wake of the mobile government push, China has launched a mobile government construction process. Many local governments have launched a mobile government app to facilitate information release and provide new mobile services for the public. As a new method of government innovation and management, mobile government can improve administrative efficiency to a great extent, reduce administrative costs and relieve the workload of civil servants, including by improving the public credit of the government and the strength of supervision. Mobile governments experience a watershed moment, a development period, and a period in which the population continues to increase and its influence continues to be enhanced, after which the system enters a normal operation period. However, despite the recognized benefits of mobile government use for older people, this group still evidences lower levels of use of the service compared with younger people. According to data from CNNIC (China Internet Network Information Center, 2021), less than one-third of people aged 60 and over in China have ever used a mobile government. Despite the fact that older adults are increasingly using smart phones and mobile internet, research shows that senior citizens are less likely to use mobile government than all other age groups. Consequently, the study of mobile government acceptance and use by senior citizens has become an increasingly relevant field of study.
In recent decades, several theoretical models have been proposed to predict and explain the acceptance and usage of technology, with particular reference to the technology acceptance model (TAM) (F. D. Davis, 1989). To date, few studies have employed these frameworks to understand mobile government adoption among older adults. The objective of this study is to build a mobile government adoption behavior model with general reference value and to provide suggestions for the development and promotion of related technologies. The TAM framework is expanded to more accurately predict mobile government usage within the consumer context. The model not only measures the constructs of users’ attitudes, perceived external support, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived risk, and self-efficacy but also evaluates the effects of elderly users’ orientation levels on mobile government adoption. By presenting the psychological and behavioral characteristics of mobile government users in China, the study results contribute to the theory of technology adoption and provide suggestions for the development and promotion of mobile government.
The remainder of this paper includes four sections. Section 2 presents a review of past studies of information technology use and adoption by older adults and then proposes the extended model and research hypothesis. In Section 3,the methodology is described, and the results are presented. Section 4 discusses the research results, while Section 5 proposes recommendations for management and concludes the whole study.