The Social Influence of User Emotional Expression on the Acceptance of Information Systems by Peer Users in Organizations

Information systems have crucial functions in a modern organization. Yet, for such technologies to fulfil their goals, they must be accepted and used by the employees in their organizations. Present models explaining acceptance and use of technology are somewhat limited due to their strong focus on the cognitive and behavioral factors influencing user adoption of information systems, while mostly ignoring affective factors that are likely to play an important role in this process. Research that does consider affective factors typically focuses on the affective reactions of users of the systems and how these influence aspects such as system acceptance. Recently, psychological research has established the crucial role of emotions and other affective states in basic human functioning. In particular, psychological research has stressed the important social function of emotions by indicating how the emotion of one individual may affect others. In line with advancement in the understanding of the social role of emotions, using an experimental design, this study examined the effect on one user's emotional expressions, emitted in response to his or her experience of assimilating a new information system, on peer observers who are also about to be exposed to the new system and are using it. Our results show that exposure to emotions expressed by peer users have an impact on the observer and his perception of the Information System. This study opens a window to further research in the context of emotions-Information Systems relationships and has a potential implications for Information system adoption in organizations.