Adoption of Second Life in Higher Education: Comparing the Effect of Utilitarian and Hedonic Behaviours

Introduction

Second Life is a popular 3-D multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) which is gaining wide spread acceptance from educators and students. A large number of prominent educational institutions have established virtual campuses in Second Life¹. Despite the fact that Web technologies like Second Life are seen as next-generation platforms for Web users, their acceptance remains a big challenge in order to become mainstream (Shin & Kim, 2008). Also, due to infancy of MUVEs in higher education very little academic research is available on the adoption of Second Life.

To better understand this emerging virtual learning environment it is vital to understand the significant predictors of Second Life usage. In Information Systems research, several theoretical models have attempted to explain the adoption of new technology. Of these, technology acceptance model (TAM) is the most researched. TAM, originally developed by Davis and his colleagues, attempts to explain or predict individuals’ acceptance of computer-based systems and underlying influencing factors (Davis, 1989). The core TAM constructs are perceived usefulness and perceived ease-of-use which capture utilitarian aspects of users intentions to adopt (or not to adopt) a technology. Computer self-efficacy is another utilitarian construct that has been used in a number of technology adoption studies. It is originally derived from Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) which explains individual’s belief in one’s own capabilities to use computers in diverse situations (Compeau & Higgins, 1995). Despite the importance of the utilitarian notion in gauging technology adoption patterns, some recent studies also suggest investigating upon facets of human behaviour that are likely to capture hedonic consumption of emerging Web technologies (Hsu & Lu, 2004). Hedonic consumption behaviours relate to multisensory, imaginary and emotional aspect of one’s experience with products (Hirschman & Holbrook, 1982), mainly explained through emotional and imaginative responses (Hirschman, 1983; Lacher & Mizerski, 1994). Since Second Life constitutes a large entertainment element along with its multi-user and interactive nature, it could be a typical subject for hedonic consumption constructs.

This paper builds on a previous study conducted by the authors by analysing the impact of hedonic variables on adoption of Second Life (Saeed, Yang, & Sinnappan, 2009). However, after completing the first study the authors decided to analyse the adoption of Second Life from a different angle, i.e., by comparing the impact of hedonic and utilitarian variables. In order to capture the utilitarian and hedonic aspects of Second Life usage, we propose an extension to the original TAM, by including emotional and imaginative responses along with TAM constructs and computer self-efficacy. One of the driving factors motivating this research could be attributed to the growth of MUVEs and their increased use in the higher education scene. Thus, this paper aims at analysing adoption of a popular Web 2.0 technology called Second Life by looking at hedonic and utilitarian aspects. The rest of the paper is organised as follows. The second section presents an overview of academic uses of Second Life: technology acceptance model; computer self-efficacy; and, hedonic consumption behaviours. The research hypotheses and model development process is explained in the third section. Data collection procedures are explained in the fourth section. The fifth section presents the study results while the sixth section discusses the study findings, theoretical contributions, practical implications and limitations. The seventh section concludes the study and points out some directions for future work.