The Willingness to Adopt Technology

One of the greatest things about coputer technology for me is that it is constantly changing. There is always someone new and exciting to learn. Some people hate computers and software for that very reason




I was speaking to an English professor who lamented the fact that the college IT department updated and changed the teachers’ preferred word processor every few years. He was not technically minded and struggled to relearn. As an example. Look at the difference in interface between Microsoft Office 2003 and Office 2007. It requires a learning curve.

In Shaping Things, Bruce Sterling talks about the two different areas where we must weight the benefits and costs of learning a new technology, cognitive load and opportunity load. The cognitive load is the brainpower required to learn the technology. The opportunity load is the opportunities that we would pass up to work on this project.

Some people aren’t willing or able to put the time and effort into learning these new technologies. I worked for the Franklin College IT department at their helpdesk a few years ago. Whenever someone would have a problem with the computers I woiuld ask them if they wanted to actually perform the steps to fix the problem. I have found that people learn the steps better if they do it themselves vesus me doing it for them. Most of the time I was told “Just do it.”

Everett M. Rogers put forth the Diffusion of Innovations curve that shows over time how people adapt a new techonolgy. Where do you think the English professor was on the curve?


I worked in a hospital registration department for almost for years. One of the goals was to transfer to a paoperless registration. They scanned the patient’s doctor’s order into the computer and printed the registration material for the patient to take to the department. I don’t think we completely achieved the goal, but I saw the adaptation of the technology.
First there was paper only, then both systems were in use, and lastly most of the the information was transferred into the computer system. Sterling says “We know there has been a revolution in technoculture when that technoculture cannot voluntarily return to the previous technocultural condition” This is called the Line of No Return. I think we have passed that when it comes to computer use.

**Images 1. Office 2003 interface
2. Office 2007 interface
3. Bruce Sterling reading by his (c)lamp which he designed
4. Everett Rogers' Diffusion of Inovations curve