Article ID: | iaor20061603 |
Country: | United States |
Volume: | 23 |
Issue: | 4 |
Start Page Number: | 530 |
End Page Number: | 544 |
Publication Date: | Sep 2004 |
Journal: | Marketing Science |
Authors: | Stremersch Stefan, Bulte Christophe Van den |
Keywords: | behaviour, innovation |
Standard diffusion models capture social contagion only coarsely and do not allow one to operationalize different contagion mechanisms. Moreover, there is increasing skepticism about the importance of contagion and, as has long been known, S-shaped diffusion curves can also result from heterogeneity in the propensity to adopt. We present hypotheses about conditions under which specific contagion mechanisms and income heterogeneity are more pronounced, and test these hypotheses using a meta-analysis of the