JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Wearable fitness trackers are used across multiple settings rather than during a single, isolated technology task. Their adoption therefore depends not only on whether users perceive them as useful and easy to operate, but also on whether the device fits their routines, preferences, work practices, and social environments. This study examines these relationships among adults residing in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Objective:

This study places perceived compatibility at the center of that problem. Compatibility is operationalized as the degree to which a tracker fits the respondent’s work, established practices, preferences, routines, and lifestyle. These considerations differ from technical capability: a device may be useful and easy to operate but still fail to fit the circumstances in which a person expects to wear and use it. Previous studies of fitness wearables in China and Malaysia reported positive relationships between compatibility and intention [10,11]. The present study extends that perspective by testing whether compatibility also serves as an indirect pathway through which social influence and technology visibility relate to intention.

Methods:

Data were collected from 205 respondents through a convenience and referral-based online survey and analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) with 10,000 bootstrap subsamples.

Results:

Perceived compatibility emerged as the only statistically significant direct predictor of intention to use (β = .439, 95% CI [.215, .641], p < .001, f² = .174). Social influence and technology visibility were not directly associated with intention; however, both showed significant indirect associations through compatibility. In addition, the serial pathway from social influence to visibility, visibility to compatibility, and compatibility to intention was significant (β = .110, p = .001). Social influence was also strongly associated with perceived visibility, ease of use, usefulness, and compatibility. The model explained 50.8% of the variance in use intention. These findings suggest that, within this sample, favorable evaluations of usefulness, ease of use, social influence, and visibility do not independently explain intention once perceived everyday compatibility is considered. The results should nevertheless be interpreted cautiously because the study is cross-sectional, the sample was recruited through a university-centered referral network, intention combines adoption and continued-use perspectives, and the estimated-model SRMR indicates potential structural misspecification. The study therefore positions compatibility as a theoretically relevant mechanism that warrants further testing through longitudinal, representative, and behavior-based research on wearable technology.

Conclusions:

This study examined how social influence, technology visibility, perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and perceived compatibility relate to fitness-tracker use intention among adults residing in the UAE. The main structural result was that perceived compatibility was the only statistically significant direct predictor of intention (β = .439, p < .001). Social influence and visibility were not directly associated with intention, but both had significant indirect associations through compatibility. Social influence was also strongly associated with respondents’ evaluations of visibility, ease of use, usefulness, and compatibility. The findings therefore point to a distinction between favorable perceptions of a technology and its perceived fit within everyday life. Within this sample and model, compatibility provided the clearest direct link to intention, whereas social and visibility effects were expressed through compatibility rather than through direct intention paths. At the same time, the cross-sectional referral design, mixed adoption/continued-use outcome, potential common-method effects, response-quality concerns, and relatively high estimated-model SRMR limit the strength of the conclusions. The principal contribution is consequently not a causal explanation of wearable adoption in the UAE, but an empirically testable proposition: for technologies worn throughout the day, perceived fit with routines and practices may deserve a more central position alongside conventional usefulness and ease-of-use beliefs. Longitudinal research that distinguishes first adoption from continued use, improves measurement of compatibility, and incorporates observed behavior would provide a stronger test of this proposition. This is evidence about one cross-sectional referral sample, not a causal account of wearable adoption in the UAE. Its main value is to identify a result worth testing again: assessments of whether a tracker fits everyday practices may distinguish intention more clearly than favorable ratings of usefulness, ease, social approval, or noticeability. A longitudinal comparison of adoption and continued use would provide a stronger test.