Serious games providing opportunities to empower citizen engagement and participation in e-government services

Serious games are electronic games designed not primarily for entertainment but for purposes such as education, training, health, military, politics, advertising and business. Communication between governments and citizens via electronic channels (i.e. e-government)to deliver services is difficult in developing countries due to limited IT knowledge, user experience and trust issues. Serious games can potentially improve citizen engagement in e-services by helping users expand their personal knowledge regarding services benefits, privacy and security. The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the extent to which an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and Trustworthiness Model (TM) facilitate the use of serious games in e-government services and empower citizen engagement and participation. In this research, the benefits of serious games are assayed in terms of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use in TAM, as well as increased Internet and government trust in TM to form a conceptual model of factors that influence citizen adoption of e-government initiatives. The model provides a new way to assist governments in increasing citizens' engagement of their online services.