Applying QCA with Fuzzy Logic to Generate a Refined set of Factors for Information Systems Adoption: The Case of Public Ecuadorian Organization, an Example of IS Adoption in Emerging Economies

Nayeth I Alcivar,Louis Sanzogni,Luke Houghton

doi:10.3991/ijoe.v15i03.9833

Abstract

Information Systems (IS) research continues to contribute to a long list of technology adoption factors from many studies conducted outside the Latin American (LAT) nations. These investigations fail to appropriate the context of IS adoption in LAT. This fail is mainly due to the geographical scope of existing studies. Those aimed at North America for example, are out of context regarding a diverse technological approach when applied to LAT. Further, uncertainty and an inability to predict outcomes of technology adoption, create variances in results because the local contexts are not considered. The reasons for this are unclear from existing studies. To detailed explore this problem further, a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) was applied to LAT economies, expecting to assess a refined set of drivers from existing technology adoption studies. A Fuzzy Logic process was used to refine these drivers. The research found that fourteen themes are candidates for future study purposes. The drivers provide LAT stakeholders, as well as actors from other emerging economies, with a contextual frame that can be the basis for adopting technology more meaningfully within these nations

Highlights

Predicting Information Systems (IS) adoption outcomes in public organizations is challenging
The results demonstrated a fine-grained categorization of themes and sets of similar characteristics could be explored in different Latin American (LAT) organizational contexts
The results obtained by computing all the causal recipes for the 50 themes concerning the three previous stage processes, were stored in a different table

Summary

Introduction

Predicting IS adoption outcomes in public organizations is challenging. in LAT economies where a scarcity of related technological studies is evident [1, 2]. This end, a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), applying fuzzy logic techniques, is used as a qualitative-quantitative bridging methodology to analyze predetermined sets of responses by examining necessary and/or sufficient related conditions [5] for adoption IS in LAT regions. Servant and Jones [6] for example, use fuzzy logic in historical analysis to improve revisions of larger code sets accurately. These authors argued that a fuzzy technique is more precise than other methods, because it enables researchers to reduce large coding sets to more concisely defined ones

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