An Investigation of the Factors that Predict University Instructors’ Intentions to Adopt Social Media into Their Teaching

Abstract

This study identifies the factors that affect faculty members’ intentions to use social media tools in their teaching activities at the Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University (IAU). Based on the Decomposed Theory of Planned Behavior (DTPB) model, which was designed on a quantitative approach, the study indicates that attitude and subjective norms are significant predictors for faculty members’ intentions to integrate social media into their teaching, but the perceived behavior control is not a significant factor. The results also show that there was no significant difference in faculty members’ intention to adopt social media for teaching purposes that could be attributed to their gender, nationality, or academic ranks. However, there was a significant difference in faculty intentions between those who teach in Arts and Education colleges and faculty members who teach in Health colleges. Specifically, faculty in the Arts and Education colleges show more significantly intentions to use social media than those in the Health colleges.

Keywords: social media, faculty members, acceptance, dtpb, adopting, teaching