Purpose

The emergence of mHealth applications has led to the rise of health-based services delivered over smartphones. Younger people are often found to be more innovative toward technology, especially related to smartphones (Rai et al., 2013). Most mHealth application downloaders are continually shifting between applications because of the hyper-competition making achieving loyal consumers challenging (Racherla et al., 2012). The purpose of this paper is to study the determinants that help increase young consumers mHealth application loyalty. This study integrates self-determination theory (SDT), gamification elements and engagement to examine loyalty.

Design/methodology/approach

A valid sample of 263 college student’s data was obtained for data analysis from a survey conducted in multiple campuses of the Delhi University in India.

Findings

The three psychological needs: need for autonomy, need for competence and need for relatedness, showed a positive impact on intrinsic motivation. From the gamification factors; perceived playfulness, the level of challenge and social interaction, only the first two showed a positive impact on extrinsic motivation. Both motivation factors influence engagement, showing a frequent interaction with the application, leading to loyalty.

Originality/value

Previous studies examined the adoption of mHealth services, this study is one of the first to examine young consumers’ loyalty in using mhealth apps. It sheds light on the existing literature and contributes to research on mHealth applications by determining the factors that lead to loyalty by the young consumers.

中文翻译：

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年轻消费者的移动健康 (mHealth) 应用忠诚度

目的

移动医疗应用的出现导致了通过智能手机提供的基于健康的服务的兴起。人们经常发现年轻人对技术更具创新性，尤其是与智能手机相关的技术（Rai等人，2013 年）。大多数移动医疗应用程序下载者都在不断地在应用程序之间转换，因为超级竞争使得实现忠诚的消费者具有挑战性（Racherla等人，2012 年）。本文的目的是研究有助于提高年轻消费者移动医疗应用忠诚度的决定因素。本研究整合了自我决定理论 (SDT)、游戏化元素和参与度来检验忠诚度。

设计/方法/方法

从在印度德里大学的多个校区进行的一项调查中，获得了 263 名大学生数据的有效样本，用于数据分析。

调查结果

三种心理需要：自主性需要、能力需要和关联性需要，对内在动机有正向影响。从游戏化因素；感知的游戏性、挑战水平和社交互动，只有前两者对外在动机有积极影响。这两个动机因素都会影响参与度，显示出与应用程序的频繁交互，从而导致忠诚度。

原创性/价值

之前的研究调查了移动医疗服务的采用情况，这项研究是最早检查年轻消费者使用移动医疗应用程序忠诚度的研究之一。它阐明了现有文献，并通过确定导致年轻消费者忠诚的因素来促进移动医疗应用的研究。