A Socio-Cognitive Model of Technology Evolution: The Case of Cochlear Implants

Abstract

(Rosenberg, 1982;David, 1985;Arthur, 1988). In a similar vein, other scholars have examined how individuals create the institutional environment that shapes a technology's emergence (Barley, 1986;Weick, 1990). The "institutional" perspective has given rise to the notion that technological development is a co-evolutionary phenomenon, wherein there is a continual and reciprocal interaction between a technology and its environment (Rosenkopf and Tushman, 1993; Van de Ven and Garud, 1993). The coevolutionary perspective provides an appreciation of the view that, when studied over time, the environment is both medium and outcome of the reproduction of technological practices (Giddens, 1979). The environment constrains as well as enables the development of a new technology a co-evolutionary fashion.The co-evolutionary perspective underscores that technological development must be studied contemporaneously. We cannot fully understand the emergence of technology by means of assessments after the fact (Bijker, Hughes and Pinch, 1987;Latour, 1987). Indeed, when we observe technology-in-the-making, there is very little about the process of technological change that is obvious: it involves the "constant negotiation and renegotiation among and between groups shaping the technology" (Bijker, et al., 1987: 13). Therefore, it is important to closely follow researchers in order to understand how their negotiations influence what form technology will or will not take (Latour, 1987 Bateson, 1972; Berger and Luckmann, 1967; Neisser, 1976;Weick, 1979 The first definition of technology is based on its representation as knowledge (Rosenberg, 1982; Laudan, 1984;Layton, 1984 (Huff, 1990 Weick (1979, 1990) suggests that technologies reside in two intersecting arenas-the mental and the physical (see also Kelly, 1963). At the intersection of these two arenas, is the idea of enactment where people "actively put things out there" (Weick, 1979: 165) (Nelson and Winter, 1982: 258-259 (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990;Arthur, 1988;David, 1985). As competencies become specialized, researchers find it increasingly difficult to redirect themselves to other paths. As a consequence, there are powerful incentives for a researcher to persist along a chosen path. Geertz (1973: 5) describes man "as an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun" through the process of enactment and interpersonal negotiation (Weick, 1979). Similarly, Kelly (1963) (Constant, 1987 (Bijker, et al., 1987). Reciprocal Interactions Between Beliefs and Evaluation RoutinesUncovering (Weick, 1979: 218). It has been suggested that technological development is not about nature, but about a "fierce fight to construct reality" (Latour and Woolgar, 1979:243), where reality is the consequence of the settlement of a dispute rather than its cause (Latour, 1987). Those who emerge from the dispute victorious, shape what history will remember. Others, we say, were tangled in webs of their own significance.

Entrepreneurial pursuits of self‐ and collective interests

“…Although the former may advance the entrepreneur's position as a fi rst mover in the short run, the latter provides the infrastructure that ultimately infl uences the collective survival of the emerging industry. This pattern has been shown in studies of technological communities by Garud and Rappa (1994), new business start-ups by Aldrich and Fiol (1994), the American fi lm industry by Mezias and Kuperman (2000), and Java technology standards by Garud, Jain, and Kumaraswamy (2002). Van de Ven (1993) proposed an important counterintuitive implication of pursuing both individual and collective interests in starting a new business in an emerging industry: Entrepreneurs who run in packs tend to be more successful than those who go it alone.…”

Temporal Work in Strategy Making

“…Our interest is in the latter, placing interpretations of the present on the same footing as those of the past and future (Emirbayer and Mische 1998). Here, theories of the temporal embeddedness of agency can usefully link to empirical work in the managerial cognition literature that has shown the effect on strategic choices and actions of, for example, variation in managers' views of environmental changes as posing threats or opportunities (Gilbert 2006;Jackson and Dutton 1988;Milliken 1990), identification of some firms and not others as competitors (Porac et al 1989;Sutcliffe and Huber 1998), and understanding technical changes as being more or less radical (Garud and Rappa 1994;Kaplan 2008a;Tripsas and Gavetti 2000). Any determination of what is currently at stake will thus embody varied views about which present concerns should inform the course of action.…”

Institutional Legitimacy, Cross-Border Trade and Institutional Voids: Insights from the Cocoa Industry in Ghana

“…This approach helped in building some kind of an 'event history database' (Garud and Rappa, 1994). The fieldwork took place between January 2013 and December 2014.…”