Assessing the Acceptance for Implementing Artificial Intelligence Technologies in the Governmental Sector

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been recently implemented in various advanced government applications, including security, transportation, and healthcare. The wide variety of AI applications raised the issue of adoption difficulties in governmental usage, which is what this study investigates. More specifically, the present study examines the relationship between personnel perceptions and organizational, technological, and environmental factors that affect the AI acceptance and adoption in the governmental sector. To this end, a conceptual framework integrating the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) with the Technology Organization Environment (TOE) is proposed and evaluated, where a survey for collecting relevant data from 179 employees working in four Palestinian ministries was utilized. The Partial Least Squares-Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) analysis of data using Smart PSL 4.1.0.8 revealed a significant association between TAM constructs and AI acceptance and adoption. Specifically, the relationships between the TOE variables and TAM's Perceived Usefulness (PU) or Perceived Ease Of Use (PEOU) were significant, except for the legal framework and organizational readiness relationship with PEOU. Besides the analytical investigation, this paper contributes practical insights into AI implementation in the government sector emerging from personnel perspectives. Theoretically, the study analyzes the validity of the conceptual model and thoroughly investigates its constructs and factors, hence suggesting that the governmental ministries focus on the linkage between institutional factors and individual AI perceptions for the latter’seffective acceptance and adoption.