Blog #7 The Diffusion Theory

What is the Diffusion Theory? 

The diffusion theory covers the idea of how social factors influence the spread of innovations and ideas. According to Wikipedia, Everett Rogers states that there are “The five main elements that influence the speak of a main idea are the innovation itself, adopters, communication channels, time, and a social system” thus creating the diffusion theory. This idea that ideas can spread quicker and diffuse into society faster than they could in the past due to the evolution of communication technologies. 

Diffusion Theory Today

Looking at an innovation like Facebook, we can see the change in how it affected our world. It opened the doors for new social media and a way to spread ideas quicker and more efficiently. We rely on social media channels everyday to receive news and social trends. Like social media platforms, all communication technologies play a huge role in the modern day diffusion of innovation theory. Things like message pigeons back in the 1800’s helped spread new ideas and technologies the same way the e-mail does today. When looking at history, there are many parallels within innovation- just constantly evolving. 

With this constant flow of innovation, you start to see early adapters and later adapters. There are people who jump on a trend right away, ready to be ahead of the trends. But, there are also those people who are late adapters and even laggards. These are the people that wait for the trend to completely mature before jumping in, these people are more hesitant and it could be for a number of reasons, but from what I have seen it is usually due to skepticism of the innovation or idea. 

Why Not Have an Account?

As of April 2023, there were 2.989 billion facebook users monthly- so why wouldn’t Professor Smith have an account. Well, he is skeptical of the practicality. I think it goes deeper than just not wanting to see Susan from his high school senior class’s third kid just got a  participation trophy in his second grade soccer tournament. The information that people put onto these social media sites gives insight to their entire life. Many people don’t see the severity of the information they are giving out, and those who do are the people seen as laggards to the innovation. For example, I posted on instagram at my high school graduation. From that one photo someone now knows, the town I grew up in, my approximate age, the college I planned on attending, what I look like, and so much more. The people who want to know this information, now have it. This can be seen as a positive for those who do not have these social media accounts that their information is not as accessible. That is a huge con to these innovations and the diffusion of technology. 

Does the positive of having a world where information is at your fingertips out weigh the cons that your information is at anyones fingertips?