Has Information Technology Competency Ever Increased?

1. Has Information Technology Competency Ever Increased? Hun Myoung Park, Ph.D., Public Management and Policy Analysis Program Graduate School of International Relations International University of Japan

2. Overview Research Questions IT Competency Survey Data Methods Findings Discussion on Why Theory or Model? 2

3. Some Observations Computer use: 42% in 1990, 62% in 2000, 77% in 2010, 81% in 2014 (Fox & Rainie 2014) Internet Penetration: 14% in 1995, 66% in 2005, 87% in 2014 (Fox & Rainie 2014). Mobile phone: 53% in 2000, 90% in 2014 (Fox & Rainie 2014) American teens (13-17): 87% own computers, 91% have Internet access, 73% use smartphones (Lenhart & Page 2015) 3

4. Research Questions Do these indicators imply higher IT competency? Overwhelmed by increasing information abundance and technical sophistication? Has IT competency changed overtime? Have people increased their IT competency? 4

5. IT Competency Tippins and Sohi (2003) “[T]he extent to which a firm is knowledgeable about and effectively utilize IT to manage information within the firm” IT Knowledge – “hard” IT competency IT operations (skills) – “soft” IT competency IT objects (facilities, ownership) IT knowledge and skills had rarely been separable but became separable. 5

6. Why IT Competency? How do users accept information technology and services? Perceived usefulness and easy of use (Davis 1989; Venkatesh and Davis 2000) How to use IT services effectively in order for performance? (Devaraj and Kohli 2003). How to develop IT services so that people are willing to use them? IT Training and education 6

7. Survey Data 1 Annual users satisfaction survey on IT services, Indiana University (1998-2014) Joint effort of the Center for Survey Research and Research Analytics (UITS), Indiana Univ. Both Bloomington and IUPUI campuses Faculty, staff, graduate, and undergraduate students excluding IT staffers 2,000 of random sample with about 40% of response rate 7

8. Survey Data 2 University Information Technology Services with 3,000 full-time & part-time employees Provides advanced IT services environment (cyber-infrastructure) College people are more likely to be IT competent and to use IT services than ordinary American citizens Accordingly, generalization problem http://iu.edu/~uitssur 8

9. Survey Data 3 How much are users satisfied with specific IT services (e.g., e-mail, instructional computing, research technologies, enterprise software) W/ computer expertise, importance of IT services, computer ownership, OS type W/o gender, age, department, ethnic group, citizenship. 5 point Likert-scale w/ unawareness Recoded to have a range of 0-1 9

10. Methods Factor analysis Descriptive statistics (mean, SD) Satisfaction score & rate Usage rate Unawareness T-test Trend Campus and group 10

11. IT Competency Construct IT knowledge Supercomputing service (UNIX/Linux) Massive storage unit service Research analytics IT skills (Operations) IT expertise Knowledge base Software download 11

12. Factor Analysis (EFA) 12

13. Factor Analysis (EFA) 13

14. Findings IT competency (expertise) remains relatively stable for the past two decade No significant difference among campus and group IT competent users are more likely than less competent users to use and to be aware of services that requires high IT knowledge Usage rates of IT services that do not require high IT knowledge have gradually increased 14

15. IT Competency (F-score) 15

16. IT Competency (FB-score) 16

17. Computer Expertise About .60 17

18. Computer Expertise by Level 18

19. Computer Expertise by Group 19

20. Computer Expertise by OS 20

21. Knowledge Base .73-.73 21

22. Knowledge Base: Satisfaction 22

23. Knowledge Base: Usage 52-42% 23

24. Knowledge Base: Unaware .04-.07% 24

25. Supercomputer .76-.75 25

26. Supercomputer: Satisfaction 26

27. Supercomputer: Usage 11-8% 27

28. Supercomputer: Unaware 17-21% 28

29. Why? Relativity Relative perception on IT competency. Absolute level of IT competency may have increased overtime. Awareness of computer is no longer an indicator of competency today Perceived IT competency as their relative level of IT knowledge and use. Consider technology development and others’ knowledge and use. 29

30. Polarization in Competency Fast IT development and high sophistication Highly user-friendly interface IT competent users are more likely to know (aware of) and use IT services fully. But no one knows every aspects of IT Difficult to catch up with technology development Hesitate to rate their IT competency high 30

31. Polarization in Competency No need to learn “hard” competency for ordinary users who are overwhelmed by IT Less IT competent users fail to distinguish IT knowledge and skills (“soft” competency) Neglecting knowledge and focusing on skills, displacing IT knowledge with skills. Rarely use sophisticated IT services Accordingly, overall average IT competency score remains almost unchanged. 31

32. Why? Market Equilibrium Rational users want to acquire the minimum level of IT competency (“soft” skills) to use IT devices and services that they want. To minimize cost, time, and effort. Pressure on market to produce user-friendly services with accessibility and usability. Supply and demand are mutually adjusted (adapted) to reach at a certain market equilibrium 32

33. Theory or Model? Technology acceptance Model (TAM) by Davis (1989) and Venkatesh and Davis (2000) Information systems success model by DeLone and McLean (1992 & 2003) Users’ satisfaction and actual use of inforamtion systems (Iivari 2005) Task-Technology Fit by Goodhue and Thompson (1995) End-user computing? 33

34. Question and Suggestion? Related studies? Any ideas? 34