Expressive participation in Internet social movements: Testing the moderating effect of technology readiness and sex on student SNS use

•We employ UTAUT and test the moderating role of sex and TR in understanding student beliefs for using SNS for ISMs.•Social influence emerged as a significant predictor.•Males and high TR respondents are driven by interpersonal communications.•Females and low TR respondents are driven by effort expectancy.•Significant differences were found among the TR segments with regard to sex. An understanding of students’ use of social networking sites (SNS) for expressive participation in Internet Social Movements (ISMs) is absent in the literature on the social psychology of student social networking behavior. Using the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) as a theoretical framework and survey data collected from 214 students in Spain, we empirically test the UTAUT theory in this context. Our results confirm that effort expectancy, social influence, and performance expectancy significantly affect students’ intentions to use SNS for expressive participation in Internet social movements. We also test the moderating effect of students’ sex and Technology Readiness (TR) on these UTAUT relationships. Our results show that the intention to use SNS is strongly influenced by effort expectancy for female students and students with self-reported low-levels of technology readiness. For male students and students with self-reportinghigh-levels of technology readiness, the relationship is strongly influenced by social influence. The implications of our findings for theory and practice are discussed.