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The Internet of Things (IoT) is a new paradigm shift in internet services mentioned for the first time by Ashton in 1999 (Gao & Bai, 2014). The new technology is a result of the advancement in telecommunication that includes the expansion of broadband, new IP protocol version, and the integration of nanotechnology into countless electronic devices ranging from mobile phones to vehicles among others. IoT is driven by the idea of integrating electronic devices with a network and simultaneously allowing the integration between the devices and the users (Gómez et al., 2013). IoT is beginning to grow significantly, as consumers, businesses, and governments recognize the benefits of connecting devices to the Internet (Business Insider, 2014). IoT promises increased efficiency within the home, city, and workplace by giving control to the users. It consists of three levels that include the hardware in the first level followed by the infrastructure in the second level and the application and services in the third level (Gu & Liu, 2013; Gómez et al., 2013).
While earlier studies have examined the technical issues of implementing the IoT technology (Shang et al., 2012; Medaglia & Serbanati, 2010; Schlick et al., 2013), little attention has been devoted to understanding the acceptance of the IoT technologies from the perspective of individual consumers (Li & Wang, 2013). Furthermore, previous research has not investigated the impacts of the technology characteristics, social context and individual user characteristics on consumer acceptance of the IoT technologies (Gao & Bai, 2014). In addition, it is found from the literature that the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is used to assess users’ perception about the adoption (Gao & Bai, 2014). Nevertheless, the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) is proven to be more powerful and able to explain the variation in the acceptance of technology better than TAM and any other theoretical models (Chang et al. 2015; Mathur & Dhulla, 2014).
In Jordan, telecommunication companies have recently provided the IoT services to the public. However, the acceptance of the services is still limited. The Arab Advisor Group shows that the IoT is a newly developed technology and the telecommunication companies are confronting issues to increase the acceptance of the IoT services by the customers (Arab Advisor Group, 2015). Consequently, the purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that influence the acceptance and use of the IoT technology by customers in Jordan.