Introducing a three-tier sustainability framework to examine bike-sharing system use: An extension of the technology acceptance model

There is growing interest among the general public and researchers in the sharing economy, because of its profound impact on individuals, businesses and governments today. A particular kind of the sharing economy is bike-sharing systems which provide benefits for users, societies and the environment, suggesting sustainability could play an important role in their use. With this in mind, the purpose of this paper is to examine bike-sharing users through a three-tier framework, where sustainability is considered at multiple tiers, that is, micro (personality), mezzo (relations) and macro (system) tiers. In line with this proposition, the conceptual model is an extension of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), representing factors at the macro tier, that is, perceived sustainable usefulness and ease-of-use, influenced by bike quality. The effect of sustainable subjective norms on loyalty plays out at the mezzo tier, while sustainable extraversion is linked to loyalty at the micro tier. The model was tested on a sample of bike-sharing system users. The results show that bike quality positively influences perceived sustainable usefulness, but not ease-of-use; however, ease-of-use positively influences loyalty among users, while usefulness does not. In addition, sustainable subjective norms and sustainable extraversion have a significant positive effect on user bike-sharing system loyalty. The findings offer a range of implications for the providers of bike-sharing systems, municipalities and governments which are promoting alternative means of transportation to reduce the carbon footprint.