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National Level Culture and Global Diffusion 115

ers or telecom network peripherals and the relative strength of
both. If the results matched those found here, use of personal com-
puters would create a greater sense that the Internet is a compati-
ble innovation. Further research on the implications of findings of
global level diffusion research for more micro-level diffusion re-
search is still needed.
In terms of cultural factors, the case of global Internet diffusion
also highlighted the need to use cultural variables that are specific
to the innovation being studied. Although cultural variables mea-
sured across a wide range of countries are difficult to find, creativ-
ity can help a researcher identify appropriate sources. As expected,
in comparisons with economic and infrastructure variables, cultural
factors were less powerful in their explanatory significance. They
did, however, increase the predictive power of models. In predicting
the adoption timing of countries the cultural trait of English lan-
guage ability was a factor in the most powerful model. In terms of
intra-country growth both uncertainty avoidance and gender em-
powerment were important factors. Thus, English language ability
appears to play a greater role in determining when countries first
adopt the Internet, while uncertainty avoidance and gender empow-
erment play a greater role in intra-country growth. Although the
general notion of these cultural measures is understood, precisely
how they impact the process of Internet diffusion will require fur-
ther research.
Overall, the case of global Internet diffusion demonstrates the
feasibility of including quantitative measures of national cultural
variables into a multivariate global study. The limitations of such re-
search in terms of the level of analysis of culture and in its quantifi-
cation are recognized. Despite these limitations, global diffusion
research that includes cultural variables can serve as a first step in
identifying trends in global diffusion and the role culture plays in
this process.

Notes

1. It can be argued that this is not a problem unique to the measure-
ment of culture. Culture does, however, face problems in that it is indivisi-
ble, like variables such as wealth or education.
2. This description is the result of debates on this topic during the
conference of Cultural Attitudes Towards Communication and Technology
(CATaC ’98), London, 1998.