The moderating role of gender and age in the adoption of mobile wallet

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that influence the attitude and behavioral intention towards mobile wallet adoption and to examine the moderating effect of gender and age between antecedents of mobile wallet adoption and user attitude and intention.

Based on the literature review, certain themes around mobile wallet adoption were generated around which inputs were sought through two focus group discussions, first of which comprised working executives and second comprised students. A sample of 744 users of mobile wallet provided their awareness on mobile wallets, various mobile wallet services used and perception on ease of use, usefulness, trust, security, facilitating conditions and lifestyle compatibility (LC). To examine the moderating effect of gender and age, two methods, namely, Henseler’s partial least squares-multi group analysis (PLS-MGA), a non-parametric approach, and PLS-MGA, parametric approach, are used. The data was analyzed using partial least square-structural equation modeling.

The ease of use, usefulness, trust, security, facilitating conditions and LC significantly influence user attitude and intention. The results show that both gender and age moderate the relationship between select antecedents and attitude and intention and the influence is seen more for males and young users.

The sample comprises students and professionals from metros and large cities; hence, the generalizability of the results to the population at large may be limited. This study only examines the moderating role of age and gender. Future studies may include other demographic variables such as education, income, occupation, experience and household size.

The findings help mobile wallet service providers understand the relevance and influence of various antecedent variables on the attitude and intention to adopt technology. This will help to plan and prioritize attributes for marketing purposes to increase the adoption and usage rates. Moreover, managers should plan strategies to enhance confidence among females and old age customers.

The proposed model both investigates the impact of antecedents on user attitude and intention and examines the moderating effect of select demographic variables. There are few empirical studies on the moderating effect of gender and age in the context of mobile wallets in India.