Stages of Diffusion

Different users assimilate innovations at varying rates. The availability of information, whether from peers or from more formal channels (such as technical publications), affects how users learn to adopt an innovation.

Rogers (1995) proposes five stages that potential users confront during the diffusion of innovation process.

  1. Knowledge of: What do users know about it?
  2. Attitude to: How do users regard it?
  3. Decision: Do users accept or reject it?
  4. Implementation: How do users apply it?
  5. Confirmation: What do users achieved from it?

Furthermore, the following attributes help determine an innovation’s degree of adoption:

  • Relative advantage to users/organizations
  • Compatibility with potential user’s current practices
  • Technical complexity
  • Trialability (ease of user testing) and observability (ease of user evaluation)