Investigating students' attitude and intention to use social software in higher institution of learning in Malaysia

Purpose Social software usage is growing at an exponential rate among the present generation of students. Yet, there is paucity of empirical study to understand the determinant of its use in the present setting of this study. This study, therefore, seeks to investigate factors that predict students' attitudes and intentions to use this internet‐base software. Design/methodology/approach A survey research was conducted among students of a higher institution of learning. A hypothesized model was developed through technology acceptance theory of Davis, from where hypotheses were postulated for the study. Structural equation modeling was used to ascertain the goodness of fit of the model of the study and to analysis all the hypotheses postulated therein. Findings The findings of the study revealed that all the independent variables (perceived usefulness, subjective norm, and perceived ease of use) predict the attitude of students toward social software adoption. Similarly, attitude was found to be the stronger predictor of students' intention to use social software. The data of the study fitted the model hypothesized for the study with goodness of fit indices of the model above the acceptable value of 0.90. The invariance analysis between the genders was found to be statistically insignificant. Practical implications The findings from the present study on students' attitudes to social software usage have made a confirmatory revelation to previous studies that has similar bearing to technology use and adoption. This study revealed that perceived ease of use is the stronger predictor of student attitude to the use of social software than perceived usefulness and subjective norms, while student attitude was stronger in determining intention to use social network site. This finding confirms that of Davis, which asserted that perceived ease of use of a system has an effect on its perceived usefulness and the behavioral intention of the users. Originality/value The study is an original work conducted in February 2010.