Factors influencing information technology adoption in chinese retailing pharmacy sector: a case study from Huaian city, China

Abstract

In modern society, information technology plays an important role in the field of health care. This study first explored the UTAUT (Unified Theory Acceptance and Use of Technology) to study Chinese Retailing Pharmacy Sector’s IT adoption in new mandatory context. By constructing research model Pharmacy-UTAUT, the author tried to find out the core factors influencing IT adoption, the moderators affecting the strength of relationships between variables and the new model’s explanatory power. Pharmacy-UTAUT incorporates two constructs (attitude and habit) and two moderators (pharmacy type and pharmacy professional level). Data collection was conducted in Huaian, a random sample of 420 retail pharmacies were selected from a total of 1,878 retail pharmacies. Based on 377 valid sample data, the author constructed initial measurement model and structure model. During the model testing and modifying stage, three constructs: habit, actual use, and facilitating conditions were removed, and the construct social influence was subdivided into industry support and government policy. The final results showed that (1) attitude, performance expectancy, effort expectancy and social influence were the core factors influencing China pharmacy’s IT behavioral intention, (2) age, gender, pharmacy type and pharmacy professional level are the moderators affecting the strength of relationships between partial variables in Pharmacy-UTAUT, (3) the final structure model explains about 75 percent of variance in behavioral intention to use IT. In addition, practical implication, managerial recommendations, limitations and future research are discussed.