Ethical Governance, National Culture and Financial Inclusion: The Mediating Role of AI/FinTech Adoption in Nigerian Commercial Banks

This study examines how ethical governance and cultural factors influence AI/FinTech adoption and financial inclusion in Nigerian commercial banks. Drawing on the Technology Acceptance Model and Task-Technology Fit perspective, the study argues that ethical and cultural conditions shape AI/FinTech adoption, which in turn contributes to financial inclusion. A structured questionnaire was administered to respondents with knowledge or experience of digital financial services in the Nigerian banking and FinTech context, yielding 86 usable responses. Data were analysed using IBM SPSS Statistics through reliability analysis, descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, regression analysis, and Hayes’ PROCESS mediation analysis with 5,000 bootstrap samples. The results show that ethical and cultural factors significantly predict AI/FinTech adoption. AI/FinTech adoption also has a positive and significant effect on financial inclusion. Mediation analysis further shows that AI/FinTech adoption mediates the relationships between ethical factors and financial inclusion, and between cultural factors and financial inclusion. These findings suggest that ethical governance and cultural alignment do not improve financial inclusion only through direct channels; rather, their influence operates mainly by strengthening AI/FinTech adoption. The study contributes to digital finance and financial inclusion literature by identifying AI/FinTech adoption as a key mechanism linking ethical and cultural conditions to inclusive financial outcomes. The findings also suggest that banks, FinTech providers, and regulators should promote transparent, accountable, secure, and culturally responsive AI/FinTech systems to support sustainable financial inclusion.