The Factors that Influence the Users’ Adoption and Acceptance of Cloud Computing at a University of Technology in South Africa

Abstract

Cloud computing can assist in overcoming the present boundaries in mobile learning (m-learning) with regard to the limited processing and storage capabilities of the mobile devices. This way, learning applications can run on students’ mobile devices while the heaviest computing tasks take place in the cloud. For this to happen leaners have to accept the use of cloud computing in their studies. This study endeavours to identify factors that influence the user’s adoption and acceptance of cloud computing at universities. A model derived from a unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) model was used to find factors that influence learners to adopt and accept cloud computing during their studies. The model consists of seven variables that is performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), social influence (SI), facilitating conditions (FC), trust (TR), behaviour intention (BI) and user behaviour (UB). The result showed that all the variables influenced adoption and acceptance of cloud computing except EE. User behaviour was mostly influenced by trust, then facilitating conditions followed by performance expectancy and lastly social influence. In conclusion, trust seems to be the greatest influential factor when it comes to the adoption and usage of applications hosted on the internet.