The Province of Diffusion of Innovations: Usable Social Theory for Information Systems Research

Since the dawn of computerization the adoption of information technology has been an area of substantial research; but efforts to date have led to mixed outcomes. Many social theories have been used in these studies. Some include the theory of reasoned action, Ajzen & Fishbein (1975); diffusion of innovations, Rogers (1983); economics of technology, Arthur (1985), social cognitive theory, Bandura (1986) and technology acceptance model, Davis, Bogozzi & Warshaw (1989). However, investigations to date have been inconclusive about the ability of any of these theories to be conclusive about all the complexities found in the innovation decision-making process of adoption of information technology within an organization. In this study we further investigate one heretofore unapprised aspect of the theory of diffusion of innovations. We re-present Everett M. Rogers’ theoretical model and test his perceived characteristics of innovations (PCIs) along with others more recent contributions to this area at pre-diffusion stage to explore the theories fuller predictive ability for developing rates of acceptance of innovations. We select innovative licensing agreements developed by extreme social groups known as “Free Software or Open Source Software projects,” e.g. GPL, LGPL, BSD and MIT agreements. We conduct a survey of Linux Users Groups for perceptions with the same instrument used for testing other innovations by Moore & Benbasat (1991), Agarwal & Prasad (1997) and Van Slyke, Lou & Day (2002). We include in our instrument the validated intention to use (ITU) measure developed by Van Slyke, Lou & Day, (2000). We conduct a pilot study. We make adjustment to the instrument for clarity and presentation. Then we conduct a final survey. This research in process study identifies our theoretical foundation and the methodology of our research for re-presenting Rogers (1983), Moore & Benbasat (1991), Agarwal & Prasad (1997) and Van Slyke, Lou & Day enhanced model at pre-diffusion stage of innovations.