Impact of Cultural Influences on Internet Adoption

This research illustrates the importance of investigating the impact of cultural influences on Internet adoption. Two constructs related to cultural identification (national and ethnic) are elaborated based on orthogonal cultural identification theory. Another construct related to acculturation to the global culture is developed to provide a dynamic view of culture. Members of two different ethnic groups living in an emerging country completed a total of 307 questionnaires analyzed by estimating a structural model with PLS. For both groups, national and ethnic identification had a negative impact on acculturation to the global culture which had a positive influence on the intention to adopt the Internet. Only ethnic identification had a negative impact on the intention to adopt the Internet whereas national identification had no impact. Our results indicate that taken cultural influences improves our understanding of IT adoption.