Antecedents of attitudes towards and usage behavior of mobile banking amongst Generation Y students

Despite the benefits that mobile banking has to offer, coupled with positive mobile penetration rates, the use of mobile devices to perform banking transactions and access financial information is not as widespread as expected. The significantly sized Generation Y cohort is a rewarding market segment for retail banks. In South Africa, however, this cohort’s mobile banking adoption is largely under-researched. Understanding the antecedents that positively influence Generation Y students’ attitudes towards and usage behavior of mobile banking will assist retail banks in their efforts to tailor their business and marketing strategies effectively towards this cohort, and in doing so, foster increased acceptance of their mobile channels. As such, the purpose of this study was to extend the technology acceptance model (TAM) and determine the influence of perceived ease of use, relative advantage, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, perceived integrity and the perceived system quality of mobile banking on South African Generation Y students’ attitudes towards and usage behavior of mobile banking. Following a descriptive research design, self-administered questionnaires were completed by a non-probability convenience sample of 334 students registered at the campuses of three registered public South African universities located in the Gauteng province. Data analysis included correlation analysis and structural equation modeling. The findings suggest that while perceived ease of use, perceived integrity and the perceived system quality predict Generation Y students’ mobile banking usage behavior, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and the perceived relative advantage of mobile banking predict attitudes towards mobile banking, which, in turn, predict their mobile banking usage behavior.