Abstract
With technological possibilities in healthcare steadily increasing, more tools for digital cognitive rehabilitation become available. Acceptance of such technological advances is crucial for successful implementation. Therefore, we examined technology acceptance specifically for this form of rehabilitation in a sample of healthcare providers involved in cognitive rehabilitation. An adjusted version of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) questionnaire was used, including the subscales for perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, subjective norm (toward use), and intention to use, which all contribute to actual use of a specific technology. Results indicate a generally favorable attitude toward the use of digital cognitive rehabilitation and positive responses toward the TAM constructs. Only for subjective norm, a neutral mean response was found, indicating that this could pose a potential obstacle toward implementation. Potential differences between subgroups of different age, gender, and professional background were assessed. Age and gender did not affect the attitude toward digital cognitive rehabilitation. Occupational therapists showed lower scores than healthcare psychologists and physiatrists with regard to perceived usefulness, possibly linked to a difference in operational and managerial tasks. The findings of his study stimulate further implementation of digital cognitive rehabilitation, where the role of subjective norms should be specifically considered.
Highlights
A clear increase in the use of technology in rehabilitation is observable over the last decades
Individual items of the questionnaire used were studied in order to identify potential obstacles toward technology acceptance and eventually actual system use
In order to answer the main question of the attitude of healthcare providers toward digital cognitive rehabilitation, we examined the scores of each of the subscales of the TAM2
Summary
A clear increase in the use of technology in rehabilitation is observable over the last decades. Many of the newly developed methods focus on the rehabilitation of motor skills. Robotics, virtual reality, and advanced motor analyses can be used to improve specific motor activities (e.g., Holden, 2005; Nef and Riener, 2005; Howard, 2017). The effective application of such technology for cognitive rehabilitation is currently less common, but is quickly evolving (see e.g., Mantovani et al, 2020). Technology can be applied to both the content and the format of treatment. Cognitive exercises can be digitized, for instance (Schatz and Browndyke, 2002), whereas the format can benefit from
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have