Acceptance of a mobile-based educational application (LabSafety) by pharmacy students: An application of the UTAUT2 model

Several cultural and psychological factors can affect the behavior of users towards the use and acceptance of mobile-based educational applications. One of the methods to measure the factors resulting in the acceptance of mobile-based educational applications is Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). The objective of this study was to evaluate the behavioral intention of the pharmacy students for acceptance and long-term use of the mobile-based application for educating safety measures in pharmaceutical laboratories (LabSafety) using UTAUT2 in 2017–2018. The research population was all pharmacy students (n = 241) who had experience of using the LabSafety application. Data were collected using a translated and modified version of the UTAUT2 questionnaire. The Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) was used for statistical analysis. Based on the obtained results, “Performance Expectancy”, “Social Influence” and “Habit” had positive effects on “Behavioral Intention”. “Behavioral Intention” had significant positive effects on “Use Behavior”. The effect of “Habit” on “Use Behavior” in men was higher than women. As a result, the usefulness of educational applications such as LabSafety, their positive impact on the improvement of students’ efficiency, and the influence of the faculty member’ viewpoints on their use can result in frequent and daily use of these applications.