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

Research Note
Published on 18 January 2018

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, we 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.