Publicly Accessible Computers: An Exploratory Study of the Determinants of Transactional Website Use in Public Locations

Businesses and governments are continuing to expand the use of the internet to provide a wide range of information and transactional services to consumers. These changes present barriers to people without internet connections in their homes. Public libraries provide a source of access to these resources however it is not clear if people are willing to use computers in these environments to complete web based transactions. There are differences in the users as well as environmental conditions that may impact the transactional use in these locations. Using Triandis’s modified Theory of Reasoned Action model we examine user characteristics, affect, social norms and facilitating conditions to predict transactional website use in the public library environment.