Technostress and the hierarchical levels of personality: a two-wave study with multiple data samples

Even though IS use has numerous benefits for users and organisations, such as improved user performance and greater productivity, an increasing number of users experience technostress. Since technostress can result in decreased user well-being, it is important to understand what leads users to perceive it. Recent technostress research points to the relationship between personality traits and the perception of technostress as a research gap. Given that personality traits are structured hierarchically, we study how and which levels of user personality influence the perception of technostress. In developing our research model, we select personality traits from the three hierarchical levels of personality: neuroticism, personal innovativeness in IT (PIIT), and IT mindfulness. The results of 2 two-wave studies analysing data collected in an organisational setting (sample 1) and through mTurk (sample 2) reveal that all three personality traits influence the perception of technostress, with IT mindfulness having the strongest impact. This study contributes by revealing that user personality and, primarily, IT mindfulness influence the perception of technostress. Additionally, our findings reveal an inverted u-curved influence of techno-stressors on user performance, deepening our understanding of how the perception of technostress influences user reactions.