APPLICATION OF SOCIOMETRIC TECHNIQUES IN IDENTIFYING OPINION LEADERS IN TWO SOUTH INDIAN VILLAGESA METHODOLOGICAL STUDY

Abstract

Recent developments in the agricultural sector have increased the demands of extension services. The urgent need to reach more farmers effectively necessitates getting larger numbers of non-professional leaders into agricultural extension programs.

An opinion leader is an individual who is able to influence informally other individual's attitudes or overt behavior in a desired way with relative frequency.

Communication of innovation to the farmers is greatly facilitated by the opinion leaders, from whom an average farmer seeks information and advice. A scientific identification of these opinion leaders provides the scope for the extension
agency to locate the opinion leaders accurately and to work with them to enhance faster and better diffusion of agricultural innovations.

Keeping these things in view, the current research study was designed to identify the opinion leaders scientifically in a progressive and a non-progressive village and to study the choice patterns in these two villages.