*2.4. Social Influence (SI)*

SI depicts the magnitude of consumer's perception about close family and contacts' belief that he/she should utilise a specific technology [25], thereby suggesting that society or social network have an impact on individuals. Ref. [32] operationalised 'similar definition in usage of new system.' Ref. [37] conducted research tailored to a social networking application (app) and suggested that consumers have the tendency to embrace similar apps with a reference group to be in contact and communicate. Thus, SI could play a vital role in relation to technology adoption.

SI is operationalised by numerous UTAUT researchers, thereby expanding its boundaries to diverse cultures and industries. These studies include [43] in the Internet banking of Fiji, ref. [19] in the mobile learning segment of Saudi Arabia followed by [34] in the smartphone industry of India.

SI has been vital in the renewable energy sector, particularly in influencing the significant impact to behavioural intention [21,22,24]. The choices people make are generally influenced by another human being, thereby demonstrating and affirming the significance of SI in the UTAUT model. Therefore, the current study operationalises the definition of [25] and adapts five items, i.e., four from [32] and one from [24] hence leading to the following hypothesis:

#### **H6.** *Social Influence has a positive effect on intention to adopt solar services.*
