The yea-paradox: Cognitive bias in technology acceptance surveys

Abstract

Technology acceptance is widely regarded as one of the most established, mature, and continuously relevant streams of information systems research. Its fundamental assumption is that technology acceptance scores accurately reflect users’ intentions, needs, and emotions toward the technology of interest. However, many studies (including this one) present evidence that challenges this assumption, suggesting that the link between reported scores and actual perception is more complex than often assumed. We aim to find out how cognitive biases influence self-reported technology acceptance scores. We draw on dialogical iterations between an exploratory case study at Cloud Corp, a multinational Software-as-a-Service provider and related literature on technology acceptance and cognitive bias. Our study reveals a paradoxical relationship between reported acceptance scores and actual perceptions: Despite providing high acceptance scores, users did not actually use the technology. Conversely, users who complained a lot by filing many support tickets were more engaged with the technology When yea-saying users meet yea-hearing designers, technology acceptance scores may be spuriously inflated, providing an exaggerated picture of users’ attitudes toward a technology. We call this the ‘yea-paradox’ because of its roots in people's tendency to agree half-heartedly (‘yea’), even when they privately disagree, to avoid more complex and potentially difficult conversations.