An Examination of Trust Effects and Pre-Existing Relational Risks in eGovernment Services

This study brings to attention distinct characteristics of government-citizen relationships that should be addressed when modeling citizens' G2C service usage behavior and calls for an e-government user acceptance model. Earlier studies on G2C service adoption have shown that private sector-oriented models can result in inconsistent findings when applied to different service types or circumstances. This paper argues that government-citizen relationships often go beyond underlying assumption of user acceptance models applied across different areas, and that a more generalizable model for various e-government services is essential for understanding and improving citizens' e-government service acceptance. This argument is further developed by an empirical examination of a government-citizen relationship where use of an e-government service requires citizens to transmit highly sensitive information, but trustworthiness of the authority does not affect citizens' use of the service.