Information acquisition and the adoption of improved crop varieties
综述社会网络与技术扩散文献，并通过加纳和埃塞俄比亚的实证研究，发现农户的同伴采用决策、经验以及来自培训推广人员的信息显著影响其采用改良作物品种，网络结构特征如低分割、高信息可信度和高效信息流可加速扩散。
Abstract Inadequate information on the benefits of and knowledge about innovative agricultural technologies continue to be a major constraint to technology adoption among smallholder farmers in developing countries. The low adoption of new technologies is one of the causes of low productivity and high poverty incidence among smallholder farmers, particularly in Africa. In this paper, I briefly review the literature on social networks and technology diffusion, and argue that the diffusion potential of social networks is underexplored. I then present results from two empirical studies on the impact of social networks on the adoption of improved crop varieties in Ghana and Ethiopia. The results reveal that farmers' peer adoption decisions and experiences, as well as information from trained development agents positively and statistically influence their adoption decisions. I also find that network structural characteristics such as lower segmentation within networks, high credibility of the information, and high effectiveness and efficiency of the amount of information flow tend to improve information acquisition and speed up diffusion of improved crop varieties.