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Spatial or geographical diffusion is simply the process whereby some innovation or idea spreads from a point of origin to other locations (Gelis. Getis & Fellman 1996). Spatial diffusion can be either contagious or hierarchical. In hierarchical diffusion, the idea or innovation originates in the largest urban centre, and gradually spreads through communications and transportation systems to smaller centres within the urban hierarchy. An example of this is the fact that television stations in the United States first became established in large metropolitan areas such as New York and Chicago, and within a year or so started to open in second order cities such as Boston and Denver. Within five years, they were established in small regional cities of about 100 000 population.
In contagious diffusion, the spread occurs as a function of spatial proximity, as demonstrated by the likelihood that a contagious disease carried by a student in a classroom will spread first to the students sitting next to the infected student, and lastly to those sitting farthest away. Contagious diffusion is also sometimes likened to the ripple effect made when a pebble is thrown into a body of still water. A good example is the expansion of Islam from its origins around the cities of Mecca and Medina to the remainder of the Arabian Peninsula, and then rapidly into the rest of the Middle East and North Africa.
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