Production Information Systems Usability in Jordan - Enterprise Information Systems Design, Implementation and Management: Organizational Applications - page 275

Figure 1. The IDT model proposed by Moore and Benbasat (1991)

beneficial results of use are observable and vis-
ible to users. Rogers addressed that innovation
was more likely to succeed and be more readily
adopted if the relative advantage as a consequence
of its introduction was evident; if it was compat-
ible with the adopter, its operations and its view
of the world; if it was not 'too' complex; and if
it was trialable and results can be observed prior
to adoption.
The theory measures three major areas: the
adoption rate of technology related to time, where
the theory is a suitable tool for measuring the dif-
fusion of innovation in organizations (Brancheau
& Wetherbe, 1990). Later, some researchers uti-
lized this theory in studying the gap in technology
accommodation (Fichman & Kemerer, 1999).
Second, the work of Brancheau and Wetherbe
(1990) included demographic factors related to
the innovator characteristics that were explored
in addition to the original factors proposed in
the original theory. Brancheau and Wetherbe
concluded that younger individuals were more
receptive to technology adoption earlier in the
process. Also, better educated individuals (subjects
with higher degrees of education) were more open
to interacting with the technology and thus were
the ones with initiatives and opinion. Finally, the
same authors explored the adoption of technology,
where they anticipated that adopting a technology
would go through four stages: awareness, persua-
sion, decision and implementation. The work of
Brancheau & Wetherbe, coincides with the work
of Agarwal (2000) with respect to the four adop-
tion stages reported. Agarwal proclaimed that the
IDT provides a better explanation of the adoption
process and its interaction with time.

The work done by Moore and Benbasat (1991)
is considered one of the important milestones in
the life of this theory, where they used Rogers'
work to develop a well validated instrument to
measure the factors involved in predicting the
rate of adoption. Moore and Benbasat built an
instrument that explains the rate of adoption with
reliable level of measurement. They added at the
first stage of their study two major constructs
and found them to be distinctive from the five
proposed ones in Rogers' work. The first was
Image ; defined as “the degree to which use of an
innovation is perceived to enhance one's image
or status in one's social system”. The second is
voluntariness of use ; defined as “the degree to
which use of the innovation is perceived as being
voluntary or of free will” (Moore & Benbasat,
1991, pp. 195).
The constructs' formulation took a multi-stage
process and resulted in an eight construct model
predicting the rate of adoption. Researchers fo-
cused their efforts on the time extension of the
adoption process, where they used a longitudinal
perspective instead of the snapshot view (cross-
sectional snapshot of the data). The model utilized
in their work is depicted in Figure 1.
Moore and Benbasat built their results on the
responses of 540 employees from more than one
organization, where the personal work-station
was the technology under consideration. The
major objective of the study was to build a highly
reliable instrument to measure the set of factors
used in the IDT. The study included four stages;
the first was to review all the literature and the
instruments available and used at that time. The
second stage, researchers reviewed the items used