Predicting the Behavioral Intention of Greek University Faculty Members to Use Moodle

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An emerging area of research is the study of factors that influence the use of e-learning systems in higher education. Previous studies have mainly focused on the factors that influence the adoption of learning management systems (LMS) from the student’s point of view, and rarely from the point of view of the university lecturers. Moodle is an open-source LMS that has been used increasingly by the higher education community worldwide in the past few years. The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that explain the acceptance of Moodle by academic personnel (faculty members) in the Greek higher education system. The convenience sample consists of 85 lecturers from different universities in Greece. All of them reported having used Moodle. Using the technology acceptance model, the correlations between the six latent variables (perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, behavioral intention to use, perceived self-efficacy, subjective norms, and technology complexity) were examined. Five of the eight hypotheses were supported by variance base structural equation modelling. The total explained variance of the faculty members’ behavioral intention to use Moodle was estimated to be 68.3%. Perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use had a high overall effect. Subjective norms, self-efficacy, and technological complexity influenced the teachers’ intentions to adopt Moodle. This study recommends training as well as technical support for academic personnel. In addition, stakeholders should address these factors to increase usability, awareness of new opportunities for the educational community, accessibility, and the general dissemination of the benefits of learning management systems in education.