Essay Sample on Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology

Introduction

Various technological inventions have resulted in the emergence of technological ideas like artificial intelligence which is completely changing the path taken by business in the current era of digitalization. This paper aims at evaluating the significant facts about the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use Theory (UTUAT) and reviews some of the prior research studies that emphasize on the application of this approach to determine technological acceptance in the same field or any other related field. Moreover, this paper focuses on the application of UTUAT to determine the acceptance and adoption of artificial intelligence in the public relations industry in UAE considering the challenges that are facing the implementation of AI like one mind track and even the lack of emotional intelligence alongside other factors discussed in this paper. Therefore this paper evaluates the efficiency of the UTUAT in the effective implementation of AI in the public relations industry in the UAE.

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In accordance with time, the advancement of information sharing and dissemination has reformed in light of the fact that the media these days has transformed into a huge channel for sharing and circulating information. Prior research concentrated on the advancement of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) however this research is focused on the evaluation of the UTUAT in the PR industry in the Middle East specifically UAE. Generally, the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) can be understood as a model approach of technological acceptance ideal that was formulated by Vankatesh et al. (2003) with the intention to explain the aim of an individual to use an information system and consequent behavior as a result of the application.

The unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) holds four fundamental principles which include performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence as well as facilitating conditions. The first three principles are direct determinants of the intentions and behavior of users of a particular prospect in regards to technology whereas the last fundamental principle of UTUAT is a direct determinant of user behavior. This theoretical approach is very essential in the performance of appraisal for individuals to determine their level of acceptance of innovative technology and the capability to deal with it within an organization. The UTUAT theory has been relevant and adoption of technology even in other fields, for instance, a research that was conducted in 2008 showed the acceptance level of driver support systems which involved a pilot test on two routes, one in Turin, Italy and another in Valladolid, Spain. The research was conducted based on the principles of this theory holding the factors of age and gender constant (Taiwo and Downe, 2013).

Literature Review

In the past few decades, several research studies regarding technological acceptance and the applicable theory of acceptance like UTUAT has been conducted. However, in order to understand the significance of the theoretical framework in artificial intelligence in the PR industry, it is important to review the literature depicting the cases of artificial intelligence in the PR industry in UAE and the application of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) model to determine the underlying factors influencing the implementation of artificial intelligence in the PR industry various parts of UAE.

As part of the rapid development, UAE has established situations to attract wide range technologically advanced companies. However, the most ambitious aspect of the rapid development program in UAE is the implementation of AI in the public relations industry because the UAE regards itself as a global center of artificial intelligence. The country is investing massively in its own applied artificial intelligence experiments in regards to the delivery of public services across all sectors like education, transportation, and even other government services hence trying to implement artificial intelligence into the management structures. However, the successful implementation of artificial intelligence to public relations operations is lagging behind because most of the citizens are not equipped with the awareness of technological advancement.

Theoretical studies by Venkatesh et al. (2003) propose that a framework that seems popular and extensively used to determine behavioral intention for the adoption of innovative technology. However, the initial approach of UTUAT was derived from other approaches like Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) and the Innovation Diffusion Theory (IDT).

Some earlier research works that have looked into the application of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) include the scholarly work by Tan (2013) regarding the application of UTUAT in understanding some of the factors affecting the use of English E-learning websites in Taiwan. The results from the research that was conducted by the UTUAT approach proved the significance of the application of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) in determining the acceptance of individuals regarding the use of English E-learning websites. The successful application of the UTUAT model led to the recommendation of improvement of management functions of websites and design user-friendly interface that can be easy to operate hence the evaluation of the acceptance rate set a point of improvement.

Else, the UTUAT has also been applied by Marchewka and Kostiwa (2007) in their research to understand the perception of students using course management software. The research study applied the UTUAT model consolidated with prior TAM related studies and they found out that in the mixed support of the UTUAT model was evident in regards to the reliability of the scale items which represented UTUAT constructs and the hypothesized relationships. The study also proves how significant the UTUAT model is in explaining the influence of individual differences on the use of technology and the fact that the correlation between the perceived usefulness and usage intention depends with factors like age and gender. It is evident from this research that the UTUAT model is essential in enhancing our understanding of the acceptance of the technology. Moreover, the research study provides an insight into the exploration of the UTUAT model in the research application for technology acceptance.

Thomas, Singh, and Gaffar (2013) also in their research study of comparing the utility of modified versions of the UTUAT to explain the acceptance of mobile learning in higher education systems elaborate the direct influence of UTUAT factors on behavioral intentions to adopt technological innovations like mobile learning in higher education. In the research study, several of the UTUAT relationships was affirmed even though some others contradicted. However, the results from the research study showed that the effects of culture and differences in country level moderated the effects of UTUAT model, therefore, a straightforward implementation of the model is likely to result into non-detection of significant relationships in the adoption of technology regardless of the context.

Generally, this approach of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTUAT) can be determined to be relevant given the empirical findings of prior research studies. The aforementioned research works affirm the concept that this theory can be used to effectively determine the acceptable level of technology even in other fields like the implementation of Artificial Intelligence in the PR industry in UAE. However, in the determination of the acceptance rate using the relationships of this theory, it is recommendable in reference from the previous research applications that factors like age and gender are held constant. Additionally, it is also important to consider the cultural context and differences in country level in the application of this theory to determine the acceptance and adoption of technology in any other field.

Factors That Affect the Acceptance and Adoption of AI for Public Relations Professional in The UAE

Various challenges restrict the application of artificial intelligence in public relations some of which include the concept of one track mind of AI. Most of the artificial intelligence implementations currently are highly specialized hence commonly referred to as applied artificial intelligence that is notably established for performing some specific task. Particularly, it stimulates the expected action after the combination of input values after that measures the results until it achieves the most useful output. However, it is also important to note that there is no global neural network thus no methodology can be trained to identify objects, images and listen to songs (Williams, Rana & Dwivedi, 2015).

Besides, emotional intelligence also poses challenges towards the successful implementation of artificial intelligence in public relations. The fact that the applications of artificial intelligence implemented in the public relations industry in the UAE lack emotional intelligence implies that they cannot exhibit empathy. This concern of emotional intelligence, therefore, hinders the effective application of artificial intelligence to the application of customer service. For instance, the application of chatbots which has been perceived to be very effective for transactional requests because they assume the boundaries of different applications and websites which help them gain convenience despite the loss of emotions particularly in the times of most important expressive communication hence their main weakness to be considered truly valuable to marketers (Brynjolfsson, Rock and Syverson, 2018).

Additionally, the implementation of artificial intelligence in the public relations industry in the UAE is faced by the challenge of data access because massive and clean data sets with minimal biases are necessary for training learning algorithms of machines and as such, data privacy issues arise as harvesting of data is necessary for artificial intelligence in the public relations industry. The concept of data privacy is the exact reason as to why various individuals in the public relations companies tend to invest massively on the development of infrastructure for the collection and storage of the talent they are capable of making use of. Therefore, the application of artificial intelligence to public relations professionals is possible with advances mechanisms of data access which can enhance competitiveness (Ghahramani, 2015).

Conclusion

Generally, the components of the UTUAT approach can be applied in the exploration of the factors that affect the acceptance and adoption of artificial intelligence in the public relations industry in the UAE. Therefore, it helps in measuring the performance expectancy level of artificial intelligence which creates room for improving work performance. Additionally, UTUAT explores the extent to which individuals perceive the implementation of artificial intelligence in the public relations industry. The application of UTUAT also helps in the measurements of all the challenges like one mid tracking, lack of emotional intelligence of the IA in public relations and other aspects like data privacy. UTUAT would also help in determining the social influence of AI in public relations because the users of AI are supposed to believe in the system and support it by interacting with the technology. Similar...