System 1 and System 2 cognition in the decision to adopt and use a new technology

Abstract

Most models of technology adoption and use assume a rational decision maker engaged in thoughtful deliberate consideration of the new technology. However, recent research in psychology concludes that such deliberate, rational, conscious decision-making (termed System 2 cognition) has less influence on behavior than originally thought; nonconscious automatic cognition (termed System 1 cognition), which is often influenced by personality characteristics and pattern matching based on past experience, also plays a key role in most decisions. As users adopt and use new technologies time and time again, a set of general expectations about new technology adoption begins to emerge. A user’s personality combined with this pattern of positive and negative experiences creates System 1 heuristics that are triggered when a user faces a similar decision in the future. The focus of this paper is to examine the extent to which the predispositions produced by System 1 automatic cognition – both enabling and inhibiting – versus the deliberate technology assessment produced by System 2 cognition influence technology adoption and use. We found that enabling predispositions influences the formation of intentions to use a new technology, and both enabling and inhibiting predispositions influence an individual’s ultimate follow through in acting on his or her intentions and actually using new technologies. Our research suggests that concepts previously seen as “determinants” of technology adoption and use (e.g., performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions) are not really determinants but rather are important partial mediators in a larger nomological network that includes both automatic System 1 cognition and deliberate System 2 cognition.