Adoption to Online Newspaper Reading with the COVID-19 Pandemic: Case of Staff Members of the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka

The purpose of this study was to apprehend the adaption to online newspaper reading with COVID-19 pandemic by focusing to staff members of Rajarata University of Sri Lanka. Online newspaper is the easiest and best way to get news today. Online newspaper facilitators create new path for online newspaper readers. During this pandemic time, people face different diculties such as lockdown, travel restriction, quarantine or isolation etc. Thus, most of them are at home and do works under the work from home concept meantime demand for online news is also increased harshly. Literature survey revealed that there is a handful of studies done in Sri Lankan context related to the present study. Accordingly, data were collected from total population of 291 academic and nonacademic executive staff members in the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka. The collected data were analyzed using statistical techniques; reliability test, descriptive analysis, Andrew F. Hayes moderation process analysis, correlation coecient and regression analysis with SPSS. Respondents are from all six faculties and they who are in various age groups with different educational qualications. However, even most of the staff members heard about online newspaper, online newspaper usage is low. Results of correlation and regression analysis conrmed that online habit, internet experience and social inuence positively inuence on adoption towards the online newspaper reading. Furthermore, moderating inuence of gender, age and education were tested with Andrew F. Hayes moderation process analysis and revealed concerned demographic factors moderate only the relationships of internet experience and online habit with dependent variable. Study recommends and give insights to develop creative and effective future plan for online newspaper providers to increase the usage of online newspaper reading among online users.


Introduction
Today newspapers are the most important media of the information sharing among the general public and newspaper reading has increased than 2019. COVID-19 does a critical role for this behavior change (Hultén, 2021). People are reading newspaper to search day to day incidents which happened in and out of the country. Generally, people tend to browse internet to search information they required as the spread of internet all over the world with easiness. By looking at the behavior of people and new trend for online platforms and adhering to the prevailing situation raised by COVID- 19, key newspaper companies of the industry have taken steps to introduce e-newspapers to provide all aspect of news quickly for their target audience (Eastern Daylight Time, 2020). Thus, this has become as a new industry which timely important for people as most of people specially in education sector are at home during the time COVID-19 and have faced many challenges (Rajhans, Memon, Patil & Goyal, 2020;Pan, Cuib & Qianc, 2020). So that, people expect to get relaxed with required information. Newspapers are useful for people to get the information about holiday, investment report, culture, entertainment activities, nance, stock market, day to day news and events etc. When concerning mass media channels in Sri Lanka, newspapers including various tabloids have become prominent channel with affordable price as them are available throughout the country. So that reader can satisfy with one paper. For instance, Sunday Times contains various tabloids such as Fun-day Time for children, Financial Times and Hit ads for business sector. The supplements and other sections in newspapers are proliferating among all weekend newspapers as well as some of daily newspapers.
Traditional newspaper printing was started in Sri Lanka in 180 years back. "Colombo Journal" was the rst newspaper published in 1832. First Sri Lankan online newspaper is the Daily News published by Lake House in 1992. Nonetheless, online version of that paper was stopped in 1993. Online version of Sunday Times was commenced in 1996 by Wijeya Newspapers Ltd. and continue its work to date. Later, online version of Daily Mirror was commenced. Then after Lake House introduced online version of Daily News, Dinamina, Silumina and Sunday Observer. Divaina and The Island were converted to online by Upali Newspapers Ltd. Later on, Rivira, Lakbima News, Ceylon Today and Ravaya also are available through online (Hettiarachchi, 2017). Thus, newspaper industry has been married with internet to introduce online version of newspapers. Mbachu (2003) noted that integration between newspaper industry and information and communication technology (ICT) had changed a lot to people.
Yau and Al-Hawamdeh (2001) and  emphasized that internet has marked a big shift in producing and presenting news. This has created a threat for newspaper producers to survive in the industry and retain readers with them. Consequently, pro t margin has been reduced. Advent of ICT has brought a set of opportunities and challenges for conventional media (Nguyen, 2006). With the improvements of using new technology, newspaper industry has faced challenges (Domingo and Heinonen, 2008). Though the Radio and Television are spreading over the country, those are not widely affected to the traditional newspaper as it cannot be replaced to the traditional newspaper. Even though the radio and television are supplying news, people cannot get rid of reading newspapers. Chaudhri (1998) said that growth of online newspapers is inevitable for many reasons; the high costs involved of producing print copies and physical delivery. Accessing to online portals which consists news and entertainment also depend on the knowledge levels of users. So that browsing behavior of online users may vary with knowledge they have (Kobayashi & Inamasu, 2015). Chaudhri (1998) has highlighted that online newspapers always support to get, supply and create the new information to readers, however readers always adapt for printed newspapers. The same idea has been highlighted in a study as more readers are familiar with printed newspaper rather than online news paper (Schoneville, 2007). Newspaper companies also have faced challenges in attracting more readers in stay reading their news online (Nielsen, Cornia and Kalogeropoulos, 2016). Lack of the user acceptance towards the online news media has been ideti ed in the study done by (Wijayaratne & Marikar, 2012).
Printed newspapers have generated cost for individual readers as readers have to buy newspapers at their own cost while online newspapers are provided freely for any readers and reduce printing cost (Hettiarachchi, 2017). Nevetherless, online newspaper provides more bene ts to readers such as easy access, low cost, any time update news providing. Several internet media provide news and another type necessary data link as hybrid newspapers, e-book etc. News web site creators always try to use better way to all the news than traditional newspapers to attract people to visit again. When concerning not only foreign people but also Sri Lankan people tend to use internet for seeking information. However, practically in Sri Lanka, the technology is not familiar with every level of people though people have facility to use internet. Wijayaratne and Marikar (2012) noted, Sri Lanka where progress in the development and application of ICT have been increased. It was revealed that lack of studies is there to test public adoption on online news media. People in every stage do not use online news for their needs.
They also read range of online materials due to availability of the large choice, e ciency, accessibility, low cost, and environmental considerations (Herath, 2010).
Generally, in Sri Lankan context, it has been reported as newspaper reading is low while highest number of non-readers found as teenagers (Ruwanpathirana, 2018). Several kinds of factors may affect on reading online newspaper. As some of them can not use online facility, no suitable devices to login internet, some aged people have no knowledge to browse the internet. Hence, above noted count arguments encourage to formulate a research problem to be investigated as what are the factors which affect to online newspaper reading with COVID-19 pandemic. Accordingly, main objective of this study is to explore the factors which effect on adaption towards online newspaper reading with COVID-19 among the staff members of Rajarata university of Sri Lanka.

Conventional Mass Media and Online newspapers
The technology and mass media are combined to share the information. There are more mass medias such as television, radio and newspaper organizations which transmit information electronically as well as printed form (Hettiarachchi, 2017). Wireless communication is the transfer of information from any place without cables. The data transmissions without cables are widely used in every eld and the one of principal technologies involved in wireless communications is radio frequency (Arimany, 2011). According to Arimany (2011) radios are using wireless communication of signals electromagnetic radiation of a frequency signi cantly below that of visible light, in the radio frequency range, from a few Hz to 300 GHz. These waves are called radio waves. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic elds that pass through the air and the vacuum of space.
Wijayaratne and Marikar (2012) have shown that television is a telecommunication medium typically used in the 2000 for transmitting and receiving moving color metaphors and sound. In the broader sense, television can also refer to images that can be black and white or with or without associated sound.
Television has usually offered general materials for conversation and several function of "window to the world" for a fairly sedentary public (Summa, 2011). late 1920 the television has become commercially available and become common place in homes, businesses and every kind of institutions, particularly as in the vehicle for advertise, source of entertainments, and news. Since the 1950, television has been the main medium for molding public opinion. Since the mid-1960, color televisions have been widely available (Deacon, 2013).
Newspapers were become a common mass media in the 16th century. The newspaper industry has been around in 4 centuries. Perera (2018) noted that the newspaper is an invention of Europe. The rst printed newspaper was published in 1609 in Germany. Since then, newspaper industry has been gradually developed. However, Perera (2018) further mentioned that newspaper industry was impacted due to the invention of radio in 1930s, then from television from 1950s. Afternoon papers were critically hindered with television. Further, with the growth of internet after 2000 and with sophisticated mobile phones after 2010, newspaper industry faced many challenges. Printed newspaper circulation has been fell down in Sri Lanka and other many countries over the past decades due to the higher utilization of online media and cable news (Central Bank of Sri Lanka, 2019).
Consequently, online newspapers have been widely used, at least since the early 1990, to refer to communication media on the world-wide web (WWW), which is so over spring an internet application that it is often taken almost synonymously as the internet (Nguyen, 2006). Reading online news represents to the different experience for online newspapers users since the users have an active role in their relations with news industry. Previous generations mainly read the news in form used of printed newspapers, most people are today, with the rise of internet, complementing to their research for the latest news stories by reading news online. It creates a trend called "online newspaper" (Sünnen, 2012). Online newspapers are always like hard-copy newspapers not only that online newspaper has same legal boundaries, such as laws regarding libel, privacy and copyright, also apply to online publications in most countries (Schoneville, 2007). Patel (2010) argued that internet began to take shape as the 'World Wide Web', online newspaper has begun to circulate news. Ever since, the impact it has had on newspapers is twofold.
Directly, the internet has increased competition to the newspaper industry and revised the way news is distributed and indirectly, the internet has in uenced advertising trends and consumer behavior. According to the Nnagbo (2011), on the online newspaper, the users have the chance to interact with the news provider, immediately sending comments on articles.
Traditionally, people are reading printed newspapers to get to know the current happening in the country and as well as around the world. The internet provides lot of services such as watching television, making phone calls, looking up information or reading online news (Schoneville, 2007). Universities and schools tend to offer more online classes during this COVID-19 pandemic, meantime news corporations provide online newspapers and publishers release more online books and journals. As a result, the amount of text based information available via online is steadily increasing. People use the internet to seek information, read news, to communicate, and for entertainment purposes (Vermeer, Trilling, Kruikemeier, and Vreese, 2020). With this improvement more people have been encouraged to use internet further more.

Social In uence:
Social in uence is de ned as the degree to which an individual perceives that important others believe he or she should use the new (Venkatesh, Morris, Davis and Davis, 2003). According to Zukowski and Brown (2014), social in uence is the degree to which the individual con de that signi cant other con de that they should use the technology (Zukowski & Brown, 2007). Social in uence is occured in online spaces, and is supported in to the range of devices such as smart phones, computers, and tablets (Kim & Hollingshead, 2016). According to Hettiarchchi (2017), however social in uence can be an important motivation for adopting of new technologies. Early research, for example investigating the role of social in uence in the eld of e-services, has found a direct effect on adaption (Hettiarachchi, 2017). Social in uence has been supported to the customer for adaption online services (White, 2009). According to Schoneville (2007), social in uence is related with behavioral intention of use online newspaper reading and Schoneville said social in uence signi cantly affect online newspaper reading behavior. Yang (2011) also noted that social in uence signi cantly affects online reading specially news in blogs. Paying attention into above evidences, researcher was motivated to present following hypothesis; H 1 :There is a signi cant relationship between social in uence and adoption to online newspaper reading with the COVID-19 pandemic among the staff members of Rajarata University of Sri Lanka.

Online Habit:
Different people have different kind of habits. According to Schoneville (2007), habit is the extent to which using online newspaper has become automatic in response to certain situations. According to Schoneville (2007), habit was signi cantly affected online news reading behavior. In addition, Heather (2011) mentioned a short de nition which is particular practice, custom, or usage in habit or experience may be converted to the habit. According to Kumar (2018), habit mainly affects to using e-services example e-book, e-newspapers. Accordingly, individuals' habit mainly affects online services more than the time before the COVID-19 pandemic. Krishnamurthy and Awari (2015) conducted a study on newspaper reading habit among post graduate students of Karnataka University. Krishnamurthy and Awari noted that the habit make in uences on online newspaper reading. Yadamsuren and Erdelez (2011) also has empazised most of the time, online reading is materialized on individual's habitual basis.
Accordingly, above noted arguments were supported to researcher to develop a hypothesis as mentioned below; H 2 : There is a signi cant relationship between online habit and adoption to online newspaper reading with the COVID-19 pandemic among the staff members of Rajarata University of Sri Lanka.
Online Experience: Flavian and Gurrea (2007) concluded that internet experience in uences on the relationship between the reader goal and reading in the digital medium. The study conducted by Lu and Zhang (2018) revealed that user online experience mainly affects online reading behavior. All of the electronic services some time depend on user online experience. So that, usage of online services had been increased due to the online experience already users have. Furthermore, it has been highlighted that the internet experience has a signi cant effect on consumers' choices and nal preference (Flavián & Gurrea, 2006). Same argument can be found in the study done by Beyers (2018). According to his ndings, online experience of users may be mainly affected on reading materials which are available in the internet. Hence it implies that users those who have less online experience, they could not adopt easily towards the online environment. According to Constantinides (2014), it was found that experience of suffering web has been stimulated the adaption to online customer behavior. Subsequently, researcher was encouraged to have below noted hypothesis for the study; H 3 <: There is a signi cant relationship between Internet experience and adoption of online newspaper reading with the COVID-19 pandemic among the staff members of Rajarata University of Sri Lanka.

Demographic Factors and online reading
Age, gender, education and income have been taken as demographic factors in most of the studies (Nguyen, 2006). Finding of his study reveals that age, education and income moderately affect online news reading. In addition, being a male, being a professional, being in the labor force and living in a metropolitan area users play various roles and can be observed different behavior for online platform. According to Stoneville (2007), age, gender and experience moderatly affect towards the reading online newspaers. Well known and cited model of UTAUT shows the moderating effect of age on social infuence (Venkatesh, Morris, Davis and Davis, 2003). Females and males differ in their attitudes toward access online services. Females are often more concerned about the control of personal information and they could not using online services (Zukowski & Brown, 2007). Individuals with lower levels of education may perform less online services because they haven't knowledge to use e-services. According to the study of  emphasized that among demographics one was partially con rmed as education was found to be the only variable in uencing online news consumption, demonstrating that the higher the level of education, the more likely students are to resort to the web for news retrieval. Schoneville (2007) studies suggest that demographic factors of age moderately affect social in uence and habit. Different age limits have different newspaper reading choice. Wijayaratne and Marikar (2012) revealed 15 and 30 age limit readers are mostly use online news paper but 50 years above age limit readers can not accept online newspaper. Considering literature evidences noted above, gender, age and education are treated as moderating variables on the relationships towards adoption to online newspaper reading.
Accordingly, social in uence, online habit, internet experience are treated as independent variables and demographic factors is the moderating variable. Adaption to online newspaper reading is the dependent variable. The relationships between dependent variable and independent variables are drawn on the following research model.

Methodology and Analysis
Quantitative research method was applied for the study. Study basically explored the factors affect for adaption to online newspaper reading with COVID-19 pandemic. Explanatory variables were measured numerically by ful lling the basic criteria of quantitative study. Individual respondent carries the role of unit of analysis. The quantitative methods helped in generating numerical data, which was statistically manipulated to meet required objectives through descriptive statistics, inferential statistics and hypotheses were tested by correlation analysis (Amin, 2005). Multiple regression analysis was carried out to identify the importance of the predictors on dependent variable. All statistical techniques were executed with the SPSS software.
Staff members (academic and non-academic executive) of all six faculties of the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka were selected for the study. Hence, sample was equal population. Standardized structured questionnaire was used to collect data and questionnaires were distributed as follows.  (Sekaran, 2006;Vogt, 2007). Validity was checked to ensure the quality of the instrument. Face validity and content validity were ensured by the expert in the eld. Internal consistency can be checked by Cronbach's coe cient alpha (Sekaran, 2006). According to Shuttleworth (2015), reliability is the degree of consistency of a measure and a test will be reliable when it gives the same repeated result under the same conditions. Taherdoost (2016) says that there is no any constant value for internal consistency. However the minimum internal consistency coe cient is 0.7. According to Straub, Boudereau and Gefen (2004) reliability should be equal or above 0.6 to proceed the analysis.  The values shown in the Table 3 revealed only the relationships of internet experience and online habit with adoption to online newspaper reading are moderated. There is no moderating impact on the relationship between social in uence and the dependent variable. Highest moderating effect (10.7 percent) is reported online habit and adoption to online newspaper reading.

Hypotheses Testing
Correlation analysis explains the relationship between variables (Sekaran, 2006). Hence, Pearson's correlation coe cient was computed to determine the relationship between dependent variable and independent variables. It indicates the strength and the direction of the relationship. The sign of the Correlation coe cient shows the direction of the relationship between − 1.00 and + 1.00. Variables may be positively or negatively correlated. Thus, values of the below Table 4 con rmed that all relationships with adoption on online newspaper reading is positively correlated. Accordingly, all hypotheses were supported.

Regression analysis
Multiple regression analysis was executed to measure the impact of independent variables (Social In uence, Internet Experience, Online Habit) on the adaption of online newspaper reading. The results of analysis are summarized as shown in following Tables 5. According to the results of the regression analysis, all predictors make in uences positively on adoption towards online newspaper reading. Hence, it can be concluded as 88 percent is explained the adoption towards online newspaper reading by selected independent variables and the most in uencing factor is internet experience readers have.

Discussion
Mainly, social in uence, internet experience and online habit were recognized as factors which are signi cantly impact on adaption to online newspaper reading with COVID-19 among the staff members of the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka. Schoneville (2007) highlighted the social in uence signi icantly impact on the adoption towards online newspaper reading. Findings of this study aslo con rmed the same. Hettiarchchi (2017) also has proved that social in uence is a main factor on adaption of online newspaper reading. According to the study of Snook (2005), social in uence has theorized under three determinants; perceived social norm, motivation to comply observed use, perceived social norm and his nding is matched with this study ndings. According to the result of Schoneville (2007), internet experience moderately affect to the adaption of online newspaper reading. However, this study con rmed internet experience signi cantly impact to the adaption of online newspaper reading. According to Nguyen (2006) and Zhang (2018), also highlighted that internet experince signi cantly impact to the online newspaper reading beheviour. They identi ed internet experince mostly impact reader adption on online news and they developed a conceptual framework. Con rmining Nguyen and Zhang conceptual framwork, results of this study also revealed internet experience signi cantly impact on adaption of online newspaper reading. When readers have high internet experince, they always tend to adopt on online newspaper reading. Krishnamurthy and Awari (2015) conducted a study on newspaper reading among the post graduate students of Karnataka University. They noted that student's online habit highly impact to the reading online newspaper. According to Schoneville (2007), habit has a highly impact on both intentions and behavior. Schoneville (2007) applied online habit to the UTAUT model reading online newspapers. Finding pointed out that online habit signi cantly impacts one online news consumption. Results of Hettiarachchi (2017) also con rmed the online habit signi cantly impacts on online newspaper reading. So that above noted ndings are well matched with nding of the present study. Schoneville (2007) studied about demographic factors and identi ed that demogtaphic factors moderatly impact to the adaption of online newspaper reading. Nguyen (2006) has proven that age, education and income moderately affect on online newspaper reading. Zukowski and Brown (2007) studied how age, education level, gender affect to usage of online service. Results of them show that males are highly adapt on online service and demographic factors signi cantly impact to the adapt online service. Findings of the current study revealed demographic factors moderately impact only the relationships of online habit and internet experience with and adaption of online newspaper reading. Thus, ndings of this study are somewhat different with previous studies since demographic factors do not moderately affect the relationship between social in uence and adoption on online newspaper reading.

Conclusion
Findings have shown that concerned three factors of social in uence, internet experience and online habit make in uence the adoption to online newspaper reading during the time of COVID-19 pandemic. So that, social in uence, internet experience and online habit can be considered as in uencing factors on adoption towards the online reading with COVID-19 among the staff members of the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka. The most signi cant factor is the internet experience while online habit takes the second.
Contribution of these factors on adoption to online newspaper reading is 88 percent. Meantime study focused to examine the moderating effect of selected demographic factors on the relationships of independent variables to dependent variable. Accordingly, analysis revealed only the relationships of internet experience and online habit with adoption to online newspaper reading are moderated. Staff members were categorized into two as academic and non-academic. Among them, academic staff members are highly motivated to get adopt to online newspaper reading during the time of COVID-19 pandemic. Further, it was revealed that males are more like to read online newspapers than females.

Recommendations
Following points are suggested as recommendations based on the ndings.
Online newspaper providers can minimize advertisements publish on their websites since readers concern their time spend on.
Since the social in uence is a signi cant factor on adoption to online newspaper reading, contents of the online newspapers can be created in attractive manner with giving more con dence on published news. Then readers may push their peers towards the online newspaper reading Internet experience of readers is played a big role in this scenario. Hence arranging free webinars by online newspaper providers to provide internet experience might be useful for aged people as well as the less educators.
According to ndings, online habits of readers also is signi cant. So that news providers can follow behavioral targeting when they provide news. Especially generation Y or millennials (Digital Natives).
Further, focusing on generation Z or the post-millennial generation also would give more bene ts vice versa.   Research model