This article by León-Garrido, Gutiérrez-Castillo, Barroso-Osuna, and Cabero-Almenara focuses on a highly relevant question in higher education: it is not enough for thousands of educational apps to exist; what matters is whether future teachers accept them, perceive them as useful, and feel capable of using them with pedagogical purpose.
To address this issue, the study draws on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and adapts it to the university context with students enrolled in the Primary Education degree, a strategically important group, as today’s learners will become tomorrow’s mediators of technology in the classroom.
The research follows a quantitative ex post facto design and places strong emphasis on instrument quality. A 30-item Likert-scale questionnaire, structured around four dimensions (perceived usefulness, attitude toward use, self-efficacy, and perceived ease of use), was validated through exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses.
The study also provides a robust statistical portrait, with a very high KMO index, a significant Bartlett’s test, and strong overall internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha around 0.95). The refinement of the model, removing items to improve fit, is not presented as an arbitrary reduction, but as a reasoned methodological adjustment that results in a more parsimonious version without sacrificing reliability.
In the results, the message is clear and accessible: students show very high acceptance of mobile apps (overall mean close to 4.4 out of 5), with positive perceptions regarding usefulness, motivation, ease of use, and self-efficacy. The critical takeaway is not simply “apps yes or no,” but rather apps with conditions. The article itself warns about challenges related to access, infrastructure, technical requirements, and, most importantly, the quality of content, reminding us that acceptance does not automatically guarantee educational value.
Even so, the article’s main contribution is twofold: it provides a validated instrument for measuring app acceptance in higher education and reinforces a practical conclusion for initial teacher education, integrating apps can not only support specific learning goals, but also foster the digital competencies that teachers will increasingly need to teach and make informed decisions in ever more mobile learning environments.
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How to Cite: León-Garrido, A., Gutiérrez-Castillo, J. J., Barroso-Osuna, J. M., & Cabero-Almenara, J. (2025). Evaluation of the use and acceptance of mobile apps in higher education using the TAM model. RIED-Revista Iberoamericana de Educación a Distancia, 28(1), 107–126. https://doi.org/10.5944/ried.28.1.40988
