It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion

In garment making firm owners in Ghana, the authors randomly seed training in a weaving technique

From:
Department for International Development
Published
31 January 2018
Country:
Ghana
Document Type:
Research Paper
Theme:
Economic Growth
Authors:
Hardy, M, McCasland, J

Abstract

Previous studies of peer-to-peer technology diffusion have primarily focused on the decision of potential adopters. Often equally relevant for observed diffusion is the willingness of incumbent adopters to actively share technology.

In a real network of garment making firm owners in Ghana, the authors randomly seed training in a newly-developed weaving technique, and technique-specific, time-limited, one-time contracts. Contract offers increase both learning by potential adopters and sharing by incumbent adopters. Further analysis exploiting random order size and random order timing suggests that the rival nature of contract offers disincentivized sharing by potential teachers yet to receive a contract.

There is a research report and a working paper for this research

This research was funded under the Private Enterprise Development in Low-Income Countries (PEDL) Programme

Citation

  • Hardy, M. McCasland, J. (2018) It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion, PEDL.

  • Hardy, M. McCasland, J. (2016) It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion, PEDL

It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion: Research report

It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion: working paper

Updates to this page

Published 31 January 2018
Contents