What Motivates Chinese Young Adults to Use mHealth?

Abstract

mHealth is one of China’s national strategies that brings affordable, accessible, and convenient health care to its entire population, may they be in cities or rural areas. Although Chinese young adults are among the first to adopt mHealth, the factors influencing Chinese young adults to use mHealth are yet to be studied both empirically and in depth. This study explores the mechanism that determines Chinese young adults’ intention to use mHealth, based on an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). The extended TAM was tested using responses from 486 Chinese young adults. The results showed that perceived usefulness strongly and significantly influenced people’s intention to use mHealth. Additionally, communication effectiveness, health consciousness, and perceived ease of use were found as significant factors influencing people’s intention to use mHealth through perceived usefulness. Distrust was not found to significantly influence people’s intention to use mHealth.

The COVID-19 Pandemic and Rapid Implementation of Adolescent and Young Adult Telemedicine: Challenges and Opportunities for Innovation

“…It remains to be seen how advancing technologies (e.g., wearables or smart phone accessories) and the shifting culture of adolescent medicine might overcome some of these challenges. A lack of research or practice guidelines on telemedicine for AYAs leaves providers in this field with patients who largely have access to the necessary technology [34] and are likely eager to take advantage of virtual visits [35] but with no clear evidence or recommendations on applying telemedicine in this population. This study was limited to anecdotal provider experiences and short-term data.…”

Examining the Effect of Overload on the MHealth Application Resistance Behavior of Elderly Users: An SOR Perspective

“…Communication effectiveness, health consciousness, and perceived ease of use were found as the significant factors influenced the young people’s intention to use mHealth through perceived usefulness. Meanwhile, it is worth noting that perceived ease of use has direct negative influence on mHealth use intention in the study of To et al [ 36 ]. Alam et al (2020) integrated UTAUT with privacy, lifestyles, self-efficacy, and trust to explore the influence factors of mHealth application adoption for the young generation.…”

“…Thirdly, there are some similarities and differences in mHealth usage between different age groups. For example, perceived usefulness, subjective norm, perceived value, and perceived behavior control are the common influencing factors for both elderly and young mHealth product users [ 1 , 8 , 10 , 35 , 36 ]. Meanwhile, there are some differences between elderly and young users in some aspects, such as privacy issues [ 32 ], and technology anxiety [ 1 , 6 , 8 ].…”

“…However, for young users, the results are mixed. Some studies have found that perceived ease of use may have positive [ 35 ] or negative effects [ 36 ] for younger users. In other words, for older users, they generally accepted that the mHealth application functions should be simple and easy to use, while for young users, there may be some young users who want more system functions.…”

Determinants Impacting User Behavior towards Emergency Use Intentions of m-Health Services in Taiwan

“…Based on the technology acceptance model (TAM), they reported that perceived usefulness (i.e., effort expectancy) and health knowledge positively influenced the elderly’s intention to use m-Health services. To et al [ 11 ] explored how perceived easy use (i.e., performance expectancy) and perceived usefulness (i.e., effort expectancy) affect users’ intention to use m-Health. Using responses from 486 chine young adults in China, they reported that effort expectancy and performance expectancy significantly influenced Chinese young adults’ intention to use m-Health.…”