2.2. Assessing of UIS
In contemporary software-intensive systems, the notion of sustainability has become an indispensable component, notably for ISs including universities that integrate numerous applications [17]. With the advancement of time and technology, there is an increasing awareness among people regarding the immense significance of environmental protection, resource conservation, and sustainable social-economic development. As a result, sustainability has emerged as a critical catalyst for innovation in both software development and operation, fostering enhanced competitiveness within enterprises and attracting increased attention from academia (Nidumolu et al., 2015). For instance, Cao et al. (Cao et al., 2021) investigated the significance of ISs in relation to environmental sustainability by comprehending the advantages of utilizing IS within a green context. Besides, Goni et al. (Goni et al., 2017) emphasized the significance of IS's support for sustainability and proposed a strategic partnership between them to improve university sustainability practices. Furthermore, Nystrom and Mustaquim (Nyström & Mustaquim, 2014) approached the design of the system's user interface from a human-computer interaction perspective in an effort to improve sustainability, whereas Condori Fernandez (Condori-Fernandez et al., 2020) proposed a framework for evaluating sustainability that encompasses both a software sustainability-quality model and architectural decision map.
Thus, a multitude of studies have been conducted to examine the sustainability of information systems across diverse industries and contexts. In the field of education, Sayaf (Sayaf, 2023) examines the factors that influence student collaborative engagement and satisfaction in an e-learning environment on the basis of an expanded D&M Model. Additionally, Mijac et al. (Mijac et al., 2023) evaluate the success of digital services in higher education institutions. Based on the D&M Model, Darwish et al. (Drwish et al., 2023) investigated the factors influencing university students' adoption of mobile learning in conjunction with TAM. Zheng et al. (Zheng et al., 2023) proposed a model for assessing the impact of e-learning quality on learners' willingness to continue learning by integrating stimulus-organism response framework and TAM. Alyoussef (Alyoussef, 2023) utilized task-technology fit (TTF) to evaluate students' perceived usefulness in e-learning.
Due to the influence of COVID-19, e-learning has become a prevalent educational strategy in recent years, attracting scholarly interest. Scholars have scrutinized the satisfaction, usefulness, usage intention, as well as success of UIS based on the D&M Model and a number of related theories. Meanwhile, the UIS, which integrates diverse applications, has been compelled to expedite integration and enhancement efforts amidst the epidemic to ensure the seamless daily management of faculty and students. Simultaneously, educators and students are becoming accustomed to completing routine tasks through online channels, gradually developing a dependence on UIS. Hence, the sustainability of an IS that can effectively serve users has become a crucial factor in university management. To the best of our knowledge, no research has been conducted on the sustainability of UISs. Therefore, in this study, we propose a theoretical framework based on the D&M Model to address this research gap.
2.4. Conceptual Model and Hypothesis
For the purpose of measuring the sustainability of UIS, a model is proposed in this paper that incorporates the concepts and models discussed in related studies. Predicated on the university's underlying characteristics, the model added process quality (PQ) as an essential quality dimension to the D&M Model. We developed a conceptual model that serves as a preliminary design (refer to Fig. 1), and each dimension is succinctly defined as follows:
Figure 1. A conceptual model to be tested for the sustainability of UIS.
System quality in the Internet environment of a university measures the desired characteristics including usability, availability, and reliability (DeLone & McLean, 2003). It measures the technology's suitability for IS in order to determine the performance and function of the system itself (Petter et al., 2008).
DeLone & McLean (DeLone & McLean, 2003) as well as numerous later empirical studies validated the effect of system quality on users' usage intention and satisfaction (Al-Kofahi et al., 2020); (Urbach et al., 2010). Consequently, this paper provides support for the proposition:
H1: System quality of UIS has a positive effect on the users’ usage intention.
H2: System quality of UIS has a positive effect on user satisfaction.
Information quality puts an emphasis on the output quality of UIS (Marjanovic et al., 2018). Besides, it refers to the content issues of information systems (Saghapour et al., 2018); (DeLone & McLean, 2003). Information is the reason the majority of people employ the academic institution information system (Marjanovic et al., 2018), it affects users’ perceptions of UIS’s usefulness (Zibak et al., 2021). Users would have to have easy access to accurate, up-to-date information via UIS, and this information must be accurate (Cao et al., 2021); (Petter et al., 2013); (Hamilton & Chervany, 1981). Additionally, numerous studies have demonstrated that information quality positively affects user satisfaction and usage intentions (Cao et al., 2021); (Mehrolia et al., 2021); (Marjanovic et al., 2018). Consequently, the following hypotheses were developed:
H3: Information quality of UIS has a positive effect on the users’ usage intention.
H4: Information quality of UIS has a positive effect on user satisfaction.
Service support quality implies the services and assistance that users receive from the IT department (DeLone & McLean, 2003), including the competence of the responsible service personnel, empathy, reliability, and responsiveness (Pitt et al., 1995). Typically, complicated ISs require users to take an effort to learn how to use them. ISs are typically complex and require users to make an effort to learn how to operate them. Poor service support may result in user churn when assistance is required (DeLone & McLean, 2003). Nevertheless, timely and qualified help can facilitate task completion as well as job performance improvement, thereby increasing users' desire for continued usage and satisfaction (Mehrolia et al., 2021). In light of this, this research proposes the following hypotheses:
H5: The service support quality of UIS has a positive effect on the users’ usage intention.
H6: The service support quality of UIS has a positive effect on user satisfaction.
IS's ability to give users unified information, service entrance, individualized services, and complete business assistance is one of its essential characteristics (Dai & Liu, 2018; Martini et al., 2009; Corso et al., 2009), which unavoidably need collaboration and support from applications and system clusters in IS, namely, data exchange, suitable business process customization (Urbach et al., 2010). Since the majority of early ISs were single-task systems, the majority of studies paid insufficient attention to process quality.
Due to the comprehensive features of ISs in university settings, UIS relies increasingly on data exchange and system cooperation. Furthermore, to accommodate the changes brought about by this evolution, it is necessary to develop a dimension of process quality that reflects the quality of user experiences when utilizing UIS, which is determined by the synchronous collaboration between UIS internal systems. Currently, several researchers have been measuring UIS employing this dimension. For instance, Costa et al. (Costa et al., 2020) utilized process quality to assess how well organizational business operations were supported by enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. Moreover, Saghapour et al (Saghapour et al., 2018) utilized process quality to determine the extent to which a campus portal supports the processes of an academic institution.
Process quality is distinct from system quality in that it emphasizes assessing the user's experience on the condition that using UIS, including user-system interaction, functional convergence of internal systems in UIS, and the appropriateness of business process customization (Urbach et al., 2010). Once the freshmen have finished registering in the enrollment system, finance system, dormitory management system, educational administration system, and other systems will monitor the status and initiate the next task synchronously until all procedures are completed.
Urbach et al. also insisted on the necessity of differing process quality to system quality (Urbach et al., 2010). Since use and usage intention is in the same variable dimension and the study applies and follows D&M Model, despite the fact that process quality has a negligible effect on usage, the following hypotheses can be presented:
H7: The process quality of UIS positively influences the users' usage intent.
Meanwhile, Urbach et al. discovered that process quality has a marginal yet positive impact on user satisfaction, while Costa et al. (Costa et al., 2020) also observed a small to moderate positive effect on students' satisfaction. Hence, we presume:
H8: The process quality of UIS has a positive effect on user satisfaction.
Due to the fact that UIS is frequently the only choice for college users to accomplish collaborative activities when management mandates that employees and students use the system, the relationship between use and its antecedents will no longer exist. The original authors of the D&M Model assume that the use and use intention can be substituted in their model (Condori-Fernandez et al., 2020), and the usage intention may be a more suitable variable in instances of forced usage (Hamilton & Chervany, 1981). Consequently, we integrate the use/intention to use from the original model into usage intention, in order to represent the user's willingness to keep using UIS.
Prior empirical studies demonstrated that a high intention to use an information system frequently indicates satisfaction with the system and increases the user's perceived net benefit (Urbach et al., 2010; Melone, 1990). Therefore, this study assumes:
H9: The usage intention of UIS has a positive effect on students’ net benefits.
H11: The usage intention of UIS has a positive effect on user satisfaction.
User satisfaction is one of the most essential metrics for evaluating the success of IS (Urbach et al., 2010), it has the advantages of a high degree of face validity and measurable and comparable, as well as conceptually strong and empirically simple to obtain than the other measures (DeLone & McLean, 1992; Urbach et al., 2010; Melone, 1990; Wang & Liao, 2007). This paper assesses users’ overall satisfaction, effectiveness, impact, and experience of UIS by examining their attitude toward UIS (Petter et al., 2013; Marjanovic et al., 2018).
User satisfaction is often a reflection of their experience with UIS. Dissatisfied users are probable to discontinue use, whereas satisfied users are more inclined to recognize the net benefit and continue using it. Recent research has demonstrated that user satisfaction is a key factor in determining product or service retention (Cao et al., 2021; Marjanovic et al., 2018; R.-Z. Wu & Tian, 2021), as well as positively impacting net benefit (Cao et al., 2021; Stefanovic et al., 2016; R.-Z. Wu & Tian, 2021). Consequently, this paper asserts:
H10: The user satisfaction with UIS has a positive effect on usage intention.
H12: The user satisfaction with UIS has a positive effect on net benefit.
The term 'net benefits' refers to the assessment of users' perceived personal gains from utilizing UIS. Van Den Hoven (Van Den Hoven, 2017) argues that IS can only be deemed sustainable if they are capable of comprehending and embracing human values, incorporating them into business operations, and, ultimately, producing a positive impact, as opposed to pursuing only efficiency and profit. Ariyanto et al. (Ariyanto et al., 2022) also suggest that the perceived net benefit exerts a substantial influence on the sustainability of ISs. Therefore, we utilize user-perceived net benefit as a metric for measuring sustainability, and it may involve convenient campus life and time-saving (Marjanovic et al., 2018; Stefanovic et al., 2016).