What is in It for Me? Identifying Drivers of Blockchain Acceptance among German Consumers

Abstract

From a consumers' perspective, Blockchain Technology (BCT) holds the potential to decrease transaction costs, improve privacy and redesign social interactions, which potentially leads to enhanced consumer power in transactional relationships. Nevertheless, only a few consumers use Blockchain-based applications consciously. By combining earlier research about BCT acceptance with different conceptualisations in the technology acceptance field (i.e. the Technology Acceptance Model and Rogers' Diffusion Theory), a Blockchain-specific model to explain the usage intention has been developed and validated by conducting an online survey among 157 German consumers. While most of them have recognised the technology's existence and confirmed its general relevance, many consumers do not know how to access and profit from BCT. Integrating the results of a Structural Equation Model and Pairwise Comparisons between typical attributes of Blockchain-based applications, specific beliefs about BCT usage are found to have a remarkable impact on consumers' acceptance. Based on the results, strategies to promote the acceptance of BCT among consumers are discussed from a marketer's, developer's and researcher's point of view.

Validating the Adoption of Heterogeneous Internet of Things with Blockchain

“…The TAM specifies that perceived usefulness is one of the most important factors since it focuses on the user's behavioral intention for the adoption of new technology. In the context of IoT and blockchain systems, perceived usefulness was found to be an important influencer of the intention to adopt these technologies in different studies [25,26,29,30]. Perceived usefulness is a significant predictor of the intention to use IoT services with blockchain.…”

“…A number of studies have indicated that a perceived ease of use has a significant effect on the intention and behavior of IoT systems [12,25,31,32]. According to Knauer and Munn [30], they recommend focusing on ease of use to increase the perceived ease of use when applying blockchain technology to improve operations and enhance the user experience. Therefore, the role of perceived ease of use in the TAM is a significant factor enabling users to obtain advantages from Information Technology.…”

Factors affecting the adoption of blockchain technology in innovative Italian companies: an extended TAM approach

“…When people perceive a system as useful, they connect to the system a positive use-performance and they are reinforced for good performance by getting advantages out of it (Pfeffer, 1982;Schein, 1980;Vroom, 1964). Several scholars (Folkinshteyn et al, 2016;Jaoude et al, 2017;Knauer et al, 2019;Nuryyev et al, 2020) have found that Perceived Usefulness positively influences the intention to adopt Blockchain technology. Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis:…”

Blockchain technology in supply chain management: an empirical study of the factors affecting user adoption/acceptance

“…On the basis of the theoretical analysis referred to above, the respective major study question is posed: What are the major aspects influencing the acceptance/adoption of blockchain-based supply chain technology in the Australian context? Prior studies addressed the issue from a variety of organisational perspectives, suggesting that decision-making regarding the use of blockchain-based supply chain technology depends on organisational and technological factors [6,[30][31][32]; contextual factors such as inter-organisational trust factors, and technical and external barriers [25,33]; the desire to take advantage of organisational, technological, and individual factors simultaneously [21,34]; and the perspective of global organisations [35]. However, most of these studies have typically explored the use of blockchain in a single industry.…”