Notes
- The theory suggests five categories of adopters to standardize the usage of adopter categories in diffusion research. The classes are innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards.
- Innovators are willing to take risks and have financial resources and liquidity that help absorb possible failures. In addition, they have contact with scientific sources and other innovators. They also have a higher degree of tolerance risks and the most elevated social status.
- Early adopters: they have a higher social status, financial liquidity, advanced education.
- Early majority: they have above average social status and contact with early adopters.
- Late majority: they adopt an innovation after the average participant and approach innovation with a high degree of skepticism. They have below-average social status little and financial liquidity.
- Laggards: they are the last to adopt an innovation. They show little to no opinion leadership. They typically have an aversion to change agents, tend to focus on traditions, lowest social status, lowest financial liquidity, and contact only family and friends.