Abstract

The current study emphasizes the characteristics (factors) of IT innovation due to the importance of them in explaining the rate of technology adoption. Five factors of IT innovation were identided by Rogers (1983) in the Diffusion of Innovations theory: relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trailability, and visibility. Perceptions of potential adopters are important to understand their attitude toward IT innovation before the ultimate adoption. Moore and Benbasat (1991) designed an instrument to measure the perceptions of non-adopters and adopters of IT innovation. The instrument includes eight factors, five of them were adopted from the diffusion of innovation theory and three factors were added by the authors: voluntariness of use, result demonstrability, and image. The instrument of Moore & Benbasat (1991) was adopted in this study to measure the perceptions of employees toward the adoption of electronic banks. The validity and reliability of the instrument were examined and the two models of Rogers (1983) and Moore and Benbasat (1991) were tested. The sample included (229) employees working in private and public banks in Erbil. The study results showed that the perceptions of respondents toward IT innovations were in the positive direction and that can help to adopt and diffuse the electronic banking easily and speedily. Furthermore, the validity of the two models is confirmed. One of the essential recommendations is that the top management of banks should working to enhance the positive perceptions toward electronic banking via sending a positive message to empoloyess about the advantages and ease of use these technologies.

DOI: 10.52113/6/2017-7-4/54-84