COMPUTER SELF-EFFICACY - Human-Computer Interaction and Management Information Systems: Foundations - page 209

self-efficacy, other individual cognitive and personal factors, behavior, and the environment that
have been investigated within various IS research streams and to suggest areas for future research.
For each section of the paper we highlight the factors and directions of relationship implied by the
body of research we review. Within this framework, self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997) represents an
important individual factor whose adaptation, definition and measurement to the MIS field is
explored next.
Definition and Measurement
Self-efficacy reflects a future-oriented belief about what one can accomplish, or according to Stajkovic
and Luthans (1998), “an individual's convictions about his or her abilities to mobilize motivation,
cognitive resources, and courses of action needed to successfully execute a specific task within a
given context” (p. 62). In the context of IS research, computer self-efficacy is defined as “an indi-
vidual judgment of one's capability to use a computer” (Compeau and Higgins, 1995b, p. 192).
Thus, it is distinct from cognitive measures of competence, which reflect more on what one knows
(Kraiger et al., 1993). It is also distinct from, albeit related to, outcome expectations, which reflect
what one believes would occur if one were to complete some action.
A variety of views and measures of computer self-efficacy exist in the IS literature. They include
both general computer self-efficacy (GCSE), focusing on the ability to use computers overall, and
more specific computer self-efficacy measures (SCSE), tailored to the context of the study. For
example, in a study of cooperative learning of database skills, SCSE was measured as an individ-
ual's expectation of achieving different grades on a data modeling assignment (Ryan et al., 2000). In
other studies, SCSE was measured through a set of high-level statements about the individual's abil-
ity to use a particular system (e.g., Henry and Stone, 1994; Schmidt and Ford, 2003). For the sake
of clarity, we use the term computer self-efficacy (CSE) throughout this paper when we discuss this
important construct within the IS literature in general. We use the term general computer self-efficacy
(GCSE) to refer to research studies and findings that utilize measures of an individual's assessment
of his or her overall ability to use computers. We use the term specific computer self-efficacy (SCSE)
with information on the specific IT task/context to refer to research studies and findings that utilize
specific measures. Finally, we reserve the term self-efficacy (SE) to refer to the research and findings
that we draw on from outside of the IT domain.
Most computer self-efficacy measures in the literature reflect the generative capacity of the indi-
vidual to undertake some future behavior, as recommended by Bandura (1986, 1997). A few mea-
sures reflect more on the component skills of the behavior. For example, Torkzadeh and Koufteros
(1994) measure SCSE through a series of thirty items that reflect the component skills of using a
computer (e.g., moving a cursor around a worksheet, handling a floppy disk, and making selections
from a menu) in addition to items that reflect task-oriented future behavior (e.g., using a computer
to write a letter and writing simple programs).
Bandura (1986) argues that it is important to distinguish between these component skills and
the ability to organize and execute courses of action:
“In measuring driving self-efficacy, people are not asked to judge whether they can turn the
ignition key, shift the automatic transmission, steer, accelerate and stop an automobile, blow
the horn, monitor signs, read the flow of traffic and change traffic lanes. Rather they judge,
whatever their subskills may be, the strength of their perceived efficaciousness to navigate
through busy arterial roads, congested city traffic, onrushing freeway traffic, and twisting
mountain roads.” (p. 233)