Page 131 - Culture Technology Communication

114 Carleen F. Maitland and Johannes M. Bauer

showed a heightened impact of the cultural variables. The three
most highly correlated variables were PCs, Gender Empowerment
and Uncertainty Avoidance. In both the full sample and reduced
sample analyses, the model with the strongest explanatory power in-
2
cluded PCs and Uncertainty Avoidance. For the full sample R .484
2
and for the reduced sample R .461.

Conclusions

This research is concerned with the use of national level cultural
variables in global diffusion studies. At the outset two issues for
this type of research were raised. The first was concerned with the
level of analysis and use of quantitative measures when studying
culture. The second was concerned with applying diffusion theory at
the global level. The case of global Internet diffusion demonstrated
the use of quantitative national culture variables in a global diffu-
sion study. The case also demonstrated how national level indica-
tors can be used as proxies for traditional diffusion variables. Below
a detailed discussion of the implications of the case for culture and
global diffusion studies is presented.
The case of Internet diffusion was used as an example of global
diffusion research. Overall, the case demonstrates the need for a con-
sistent set of global-level indicators in all categories. This is no sur-
prise to international agencies such as the World Bank who allocate
significant resources to data collection efforts. It is to be hoped that in
the future more consistent reporting of data will occur and will begin
to include cultural variables. Perhaps someday as much effort will be
devoted to measures of national culture as are devoted to measures of
national economic growth. Maybe someday we will be able to look
back on the present as an era of extremely primitive measures.
The case of global Internet diffusion also demonstrates how ob-
jective measures of innovation attributes such as compatibility can
be used in global level analyses. In the case study, objective mea-
sures of innovation compatibility were reflected by proxies such as
the use of personal computers per capita, teledensity, and the use of
telecom network peripherals, such as fax machines. It was observed
that when using these objective traits, part of the diffusion
process—that part concerned with an individual’s perception of the
innovation—is not taken into account. It would be interesting to
find through further research whether or not perceptions of com-
patibility of the Internet are influenced by use of personal comput-