Abstract

Globalization is felt in most parts of the world and its effects on culture are becoming a topic of interest to society and in particular to the IS academic community. Our research addresses calls for research on the issue of globalization and its cultural effects in the IS field. We present the survey results of 136 members of the general public in a developing country, namely Jordan, which has felt the effects of globalization in the last decade. Our findings show that there is a significant and positive relationship between an individual's acculturation to the global culture and his or her intention to adopt the Internet. This behavioral intention is also significantly related to the individual's perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the Internet. Results indicate that the survey's respondents who were exposed to other cultures through travel and media and have learned other languages were more likely to adopt the Internet for communication, education and entertainment, but were less ready to conduct commercial exchanges through the Internet. This initial validation of a new construct, namely acculturation to the global culture as an antecedent to the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), is an important contribution to the area of IS research on cultural effects.