Exploring the Black Box of Task-Technology Fit: The Case of Mobile Information Systems

Judith Gebauer and Mark Ginsburg
Additional contact information
Judith Gebauer: U of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Mark Ginsburg: Seventh Rank Associates

Working Papers from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business

Abstract: Task-technology fit has been developed as a diagnostic tool to determine whether information systems meet user needs, and has been demonstrated to have a positive impact on the effectiveness of various types of information systems, such as group support systems and management support systems. Despite empirical evidence for the relevance of task-technology fit to improve information system effectiveness, the theory of task-technology fit provides little guidance of how to determine and operationalize fit for particular combinations of task and technology. Consequently, the theoretical validity of the concept of task-technology fit remains limited as does its practical applicability. In this paper, we present the results of an inductive study to explore the concept and antecedents of fit for mobile information systems to support mobile professionals. We performed a content analysis of online user reviews of four mobile technology products with the objective to identify issues that are relevant to users. The mobile technology products include a cell-phone, two personal digital assistants (PDAs), and an ultra-light laptop. The identified issues can be grouped into four conceptual constructs: overall user evaluation, task-related fit, context-related fit, and technology performance, and are characterized by a lower level of abstraction than the level of abstraction deployed in previous research studies on task-technology fit. In order to improve our understanding about how to achieve fit for particular combinations of task, use context, and technology we performed several statistical analyses. (1) An exploratory factor analysis yielded five factors, each indeed including a different set of conceptual constructs; (2) a case-wise analysis indicated user-perceived strengths and limits of individual devices with respect to the five factors; and (3) the results of a multiple regression analysis provided insights about the extent to which the five factors were related with overall technology evaluation. The results presented in the current paper will serve as input for a larger survey.

Date: 2006
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.business.illinois.edu/Working_Papers/papers/06-0120.pdf
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found (http://www.business.illinois.edu/Working_Papers/papers/06-0120.pdf [301 Moved Permanently]--> https://giesbusiness.illinois.edu/Working_Papers/papers/06-0120.pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ecl:illbus:06-0120

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().