It is a popular contention that products launched today diffuse faster than products launched in the past. However, the evidence of diffusion acceleration is both scant and mixed. Moreover, the methodology used in previous studies has a number of disadvantages. This study re-assesses the acceleration thesis in a single country (U.S.) for 37 consumer durables over a period of 74 years (1923-1996). To avoid some of the methodological limitations of extant research, this study takes a different approach in both measuring diffusion speed and analyzing the data. Diffusion speed is measured as the empirical hazard of diffusion. Historical change in diffusion speed is described using a variant of age-period-cohort analysis. Whether diffusion speed has increased over time and how it is causally related to some explanatory variables is tested by means of panel data regression analysis. Two main findings emerge. First, there has been only a very small systematic increase in diffusion speed over ...
|
47
|
Social contagion and innovation: Cohesion versus structural equivalence
– Burt
- 1987
|
|
35
|
Time for Life: The Surprising Ways Americans Use Their Time
– Robinson, Godbey
- 1999
|
|
34
|
Adoption of technologies with network effects: An empirical examination of the adoption of automated teller machines
– Saloner, Shepard
- 1995
|
|
30
|
Hybrid corn: An exploration in the economics of technological change
– Griliches
- 1957
|
|
24
|
Technical Change and the Rate of Imitation
– Mansfield
- 1961
|
|
17
|
New Product Diffusion Models
– Mahajan, Muller, et al.
- 1993
|
|
14
|
Will it ever fly? Modelling the takeoff of really new consumer durables,” Management Science 16(3
– Goldner, Tellis
- 1997
|
|
12
|
Modeling Multinational Diffusion Patterns: An Efficient Methodology
– Gatignon, Eliashberg, et al.
- 1989
|
|
12
|
A new approach to country segmentation utilizing multinational diffusion patterns
– Helsen, Jedidi, et al.
- 1993
|
|
11
|
Why the bass model fits without decision variables
– Bass, Krishnan, et al.
- 1994
|
|
10
|
The sources of invention
– Jewkes, Sawers, et al.
- 1958
|
|
9
|
Cross-National Analysis of Diffusion of Consumer Durable Goods in Pacific Rim Countries
– Takada, Jain
- 1991
|
|
8
|
A Diffusion model incorporating product benefits, price, income and information
– Horsky
- 1990
|
|
6
|
A Simple Substitution Model
– Fisher, Pry
- 1971
|
|
6
|
The Rise and Fall of Infrastructures: Dynamics of Evolution and Technological Change in Transport. Heidelberg : Physica-Verlag
– Gru¨bler
- 1990
|
|
6
|
Effect of price on the demand for durables: Modeling, estimation, and findings
– Jain, Rao
- 1990
|
|
5
|
The Complexity-Extremity Effect and Age-Based Stereotyping
– Linville
- 1982
|
|
5
|
Parameter Variation and New Product Diffusion
– Putsis
- 1998
|
|
5
|
A Meta-Analysis of Diffusion Models
– Sultan, Farley, et al.
- 1990
|
|
4
|
Time and the rate of adoption of innovations
– Olshavsky
- 1980
|
|
3
|
Have Diffusion Rates Been Accelerating Over Time
– Bayus
- 1992
|
|
3
|
Opportunities for Revitalizing Stagnant Markets: An Analysis of Household Appliances
– Clark, Freeman, et al.
- 1984
|
|
3
|
A Micro-Analytic Threshold Model for the Timing of First Purchases of Durable Goods
– Haldar, Rao
- 1998
|
|
3
|
Using Longitudinal Data to Estimate Age
– HECKMAN, ROBB
- 1985
|
|
3
|
Some Methodological Issues in Cohort Analysis of Archival Data
– MASON, MASON, et al.
- 1973
|
|
3
|
The Distorted Mirror: Reflections on the Unintended Consequences of Advertising
– Pollay
- 1986
|
|
2
|
Cohort Analysis of Recent Trends
– Clogg
- 1982
|
|
2
|
and Miklos Sarvary (1998), “Staged Estimation of International Diffusion Models: An Application to Global Cellular Telephone Adoption,” Technological Forecasting and
– Dekimpe, Parker
|
|
2
|
A Non-uniform Influence Innovation Diffusion Model of New Product Acceptance
– Easingwood, Mahajan, et al.
- 1983
|
|
2
|
Explaining Rates of Technology Diffusion: A Need for Caution,” Quarterly
– Edmonds, Meisel
- 1992
|
|
2
|
Social Indicator Models: An Overview
– Land
- 1975
|
|
2
|
Buy Now, Pay Later
– Olney
- 1991
|
|
2
|
The Acceleration Trap
– Braun
- 1990
|
|
1
|
Rat Race Dynamics and Crazy Companies
– Ausubel
- 1991
|
|
1
|
Zvi Griliches and Neal Rappaport
– Berndt
- 1993
|
|
1
|
Managing Innovation
– Times
- 1998
|
|
1
|
Replacement Effects, Cohort and Otherwise: Reply to Rodgers
– Firebaugh
- 1990
|
|
1
|
High Speed Management for the High
– Fortune
- 1984
|
|
1
|
Jaishankar Ganeh and Raj Echambadi
– Kumar
- 1998
|
|
1
|
Age-Period-Cohort Analysis and the Study of Deaths from Pulmonary Tuberculosis
– Mason, Smith
- 1985
|
|
1
|
The Birth of a Consumer Society: The Commercialization of Eighteenth-Century
– McKendrick, Brewer, et al.
- 1982
|
|
1
|
Shortening of the PLC—An Empirical Test
– Qualls, Olshavsky, et al.
- 1981
|
|
1
|
Dream Worlds: Mass Consumption in Late Nineteenth-Century
– Williams
- 1982
|
|
1
|
Variation in Vital Rates by Age
– Wilmoth
- 1990
|
