2: A History of Diffusion

ResearchDiffusion of Innovation: Chapter 2

• A research tradition is a series of investigations on a similar topic in which successive studies are influenced by preceding inquires (39).

• Stranger, defined as an individual who is a member of a system but who is not strongly attached to the system (42).

• Invention, the process by which a new idea is discovered or created (43).

• Participant observation, an attempt by a researcher to adopt the perspective of respondents by sharing their day-to-day experiences (48).

• The major diffusion traditions described are anthropology, early sociology, rural sociology, education, public health/medical sociology, communication, marketing, geography, and general sociology (101).

Eight main types of diffusion research are:

• Earliness of knowing about innovations.

• Rate of adoption of different innovations in a social system.

• Innovativeness.

• Opinion leadership.

• Diffusion networks.

• Rate of adoption in different social systems.

• Communication channel usage.

• Consequences of innovation (94-100).