An assessment of five different theoretical frameworks to study the uptake of innovations

There are several theoretical frameworks one can draw upon to study the adoption process. Extension Theory, Bounded Rationality, Diffusion Theory, the Theory of Reasoned Action and Consumer Behaviour Theory were of particular interest to us. In assessing the frameworks we looked for contradictions, and how and whether these frameworks could be used to study the adoption process. The assessment was done by using our own conceptual framework of the adoption process and we discuss the results in this paper. We found that the different frameworks don‘t contradict each other and when combined into our conceptual framework they offer very useful constructs for studying the adoption process.