“Gaps and Bridges in Multi-System Innovation Transfer”

This paper examines the transfer of innovation from innovators to adopters in networks that go beyond a single social system. Previous studies have focused mostly on the study of social networks within a single system. In such networks, actors know their peers and share knowledge, practices, and norms with them. Innovation thus diffuses from one actor to another through an existing social structure, with imitation (or competition) being the most commonly cited drivers of this process. Historically, however, many innovations, such as computer technologies, have transferred well beyond the confines of a single social system. Using interview data on technology diffusion in astronomy, biology, and social sciences, I explore the process of diffusion across multiple systems, by studying the challenges innovators confront and the strategies they devise when engaging users from different fields of science. I argue that three types of cultural and cognitive gaps make social networks insufficient to support the diffusion of innovation across social systems: a collaborative gap, an entrepreneurial gap, and a systemic gap. Building on the sociology of translation framework, I show that innovators and lead users utilize several types of bridges to overcome gaps and bolster the innovation diffusion potential. These bridges include specialized technological interfaces that serve to simulate, yet extend, divergent cognitive environments.