Open Access

ARTICLE

Health Empowerment and Intention to Use Digital Health Technologies among Korean Older Adults: Extending the Technology Acceptance Model

Do Young Pyun¹, Bingjie Wang², Kyong Keun Choi^3,*, Sungjae Kim⁴, Taeyeon Koo^5,*
1 School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences, Loughborough University, Loughborough, UK
2 College of Physical Education, Hunan Normal University, Changsha, China
3 Fitness MBA, Graduate School of Business Administration, Sangmyung University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
4 Gaedang College of General Education, Sangmyung University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
5 Office of Research, Chung-Ang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea
* Corresponding Author: Kyong Keun Choi. Email: ; Taeyeon Koo. Email:
(This article belongs to the Special Issue: From Tradition to High-Intensity: Examining the Psychological and Emotional Impacts of Exercise Types)

International Journal of Mental Health Promotion https://doi.org/10.32604/ijmhp.2026.078956

Received 11 January 2026; Accepted 10 April 2026; Published online 28 April 2026

Abstract

Backgrounds: South Korea is one of the world’s fastest-aging societies, facing significant challenges in maintaining healthcare quality and accessibility for its rapidly growing elderly population. This study extends the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) by integrating health empowerment to examine its influence on digital healthcare device adoption among Korean older adults. Specifically, this study aims to investigate how health empowerment is associated with perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, and how these perceptions subsequently relate to attitude and intention to use digital healthcare devices. Methods: Data were collected from 342 Korean older adults. The analysis followed Anderson and Gerbing’s two-stage approach, utilizing structural equation modeling to first evaluate the measurement model and subsequently examine the hypothetical path sequences across health empowerment, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, attitude, and behavioral intention. Results: The measurement model demonstrated satisfactory fit. Path analysis revealed that health empowerment significantly predicted both perceived usefulness (β = 0.58) and perceived ease of use (β = 0.43). Both perceived usefulness (β = 0.58) and perceived ease of use (β = 0.14) were significantly associated with attitude, which in turn was significantly associated with behavioral intention (β = 0.77). The direct path from perceived usefulness to behavioral intention was not statistically significant. Overall, the model explained 63% of the variance in intention to use, which is generally considered strong explanatory power. Conclusions: Integrating empowerment into the TAM framework highlights the significance of autonomy and self-efficacy in the adoption process. The findings suggest that empowerment plays an important role in shaping older adults’ perceptions of digital health technologies and their intention to adopt such devices, providing a conceptual basis for developing empowerment-driven strategies to facilitate the integration of digital health technologies among ageing populations.

---

Keywords

Health empowerment; digital health technology; extended technology acceptance model; ageing population

---