DIFFUSION THEORIES(1901) approached crowd behavior in terms of
social contagion: rapid dissemination of emotions
among interacting people. Although Floyd Allport
(1924) and Herbert Blumer (1939) extended and
formalized the concept of contagion, it has been
largely displaced as a theory of crowd behavior by
convergence theory (Turner and Killian 1987, p.19).
Changes in dress have been conceptualized as
diffusion processes. Alfred Kroeber (1919) stud-
ied fashion cycles which he believed diffused system-
atically through civilizations. Katz and Lazarsfeld
(1955, p. 241) moved away from the initial concern
with movement of fashion through networks to
focus more on social influence. Herbert Blumer
(1969) firmly established social psychological mo-
tivations as the basis for fashion behavior. Current
theoretical work on fashion continues to empha-
size social psychological approaches wherein fash-
ion diffusion issues are peripheral (Davis 1985;
Nagasawa, Hutton, and Kaiser 1991).
REFERENCES
Adams, Tyronne 1997 ‘‘Using Diffusion of Innovations
Theory to Enrich Virtual Organizations in Cyberspace.’’
Southern Communication Journal 62:133–141.
Allport, Floyd 1924 Social Psychology. Boston: Hough-
ton-Mifflin.
Blumer, Herbert 1939 ‘‘Collective Behavior.’’ In Robert
Park, ed., Outline of the Principles of Sociology. New
York: Barnes and Noble.
——— 1969 ‘‘Fashion.’’ Sociological Quarterly 10:275–291.
Boas, Franz 1896 The Limitations of the Comparative
Method of Anthropology. New York: Alfred Knopf.
Bowers, Raymond 1937 ‘‘The Direction of Intra-Societal
Diffusion.’’ American Sociological Review 2:826–836.
Carlson, Richard 1965 Adoption of Educational Innova-
tions. Eugene: University of Oregon Center for the
Advanced Study of Educational Administration.
Chapin, F. Stuart 1928 Cultural Change. New York:
Century.
Coleman, James, Herbert Menzel, and Elihu Katz 1957
‘‘The Diffusion of an Innovation among Physicians.’’
Sociometry 20:253–270.
——— 1966 Medical Innovation: A Diffusion Study. New
York: Bobbs-Merrill.
Crane, Diana 1972 Invisible Colleges. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press.
Davis, Fred 1985 ‘‘Clothing and Fashion as Communica-
tion.’’ Symbolic Interaction 5:111–126.
Dean, John 1997 ‘‘The Diffusion of American Culture in
Western Europe since World War Two.’’ Journal of
American Culture 20:11–32.
Deutschmann, P. J. , and W. A. Danielson 1960 ‘‘Diffu-
sion of Knowledge of the Major News Story.’’ Journal-
ism Quarterly 37:345–355.
Fliegel, Frederick 1993 Diffusion Research in Rural Soci-
ology. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood.
Graebner, Fritz 1911 Methode der Ethnologie. Heidelberg,
Germany: Carl Winter.
Griswold, William 1987 ‘‘A Methodological Framework
for the Sociology of Culture.’’ Sociological Methodolo-
gy 14:1–35.
Hightower, James 1972 Hard Tomatoes, Hard Times.
Cambridge, Mass.: Shenkman.
Howes, David 1996 Cross-Cultural Consumption. New
York: Routledge.
Katz, Elihu, and Paul Lazarsfeld 1955 Personal Influence.
New York: Free Press.
Katz, Elihu, M. L. Levine, and H. Hamilton 1963 ‘‘Tradi-
tions of Research on Diffusion of Innovation.’’ Ameri-
can Sociological Review 28:237–253.
Kroeber, Alfred 1919 ‘‘On the Principle of Order in
Civilization as Exemplified by Changes of Fashion.’’
American Anthropologist 21:235–263.
——— 1923 Anthropology. New York: Harcourt.
LeBon, Gustave 1895 Psychologie des foules. Paris: Alcan.
Lindell, Michael, and Ronald Perry 1992 Behavioral
Foundations of Community Emergency Planning. Wash-
ington, D.C.: Hemisphere Publishers.
Lowie, Robert 1937 The History of Ethnological Theory.
New York: Rinehart and Company.
McQuail, Denis 1983 Mass Communication Theory. Bever-
ly Hills, Calif.: Sage.
Menzel, Herbert, and Elihu Katz 1955 ‘‘Social Relations
and Innovation in the Medical Profession.’’ Public
Opinion Quarterly 19:337–352.
Nagasawa, Richard, Sandra Hutton, and Susan Kaiser
1991 ‘‘A Paradigm for the Study of the Social Mean-
ing of Clothes.’’ Clothing and Textiles Research Journal
10:53–62.
Park, Robert, and Ernest Burgess 1921 Introduction to the
Science of Sociology. Chicago: University of Chica-
go Press.
Posnansky, M., and C. R. DeCorse 1986 ‘‘Historical
Archaeology in Sub-Saharan Africa.’’ Historical Ar-
chaeology 20:1–14.
Rogers, Everett 1962, 1995 Diffusion of Innovations. New
York: Free Press.