The Impact of Technology Anxiety on the Use of Mobile Financial Applications

Mobile Commerce activities will not expand without the proper support of mobile financial applications (MFA), including mobile banking, mobile brokerage service, mobile money transfer, and mobile micropayments. MFA is expected to have a great impact on the future of mobile commerce industries and makes purchasing activities more flexible and convenient, also creating new markets. However, despite the advent of these MFA technologies and the availability of various mobile services, the adoption of mobile financial applications across the globe is still relatively low. In this regard, this study investigates the role of technology anxiety (TA) in the adoption of MFA and resolves the discrepancy between the apparent interest in and low adoption of MFA. The results of a broad survey of 595 mobile payment users in Korea indicate TA negatively moderates the influence of intention on actual usage in addition to the direct negative influence on intention to use MFA. Also, the author found that TA significantly differs depending on the frequency of use and gender. However, contrary to a common notion that older people are more anxious in context to new technologies, TA has been found to be higher among young people.