Effect of Linguistic Heterogeneity on Technology Transfer: An Economic Study of FIFA Football Rankings

This paper used Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) world ranking points data to examine how linguistic heterogeneity has an impact on technology transfer from the most developed countries. The major findings were that the learning effect from the most developed countries on team performance is larger for developing countries than for developed ones, and that linguistic heterogeneity has a detrimental effect on technology transfer for developed but not developing countries. The results presented here are interpreted to imply that the importance of common and proper comprehension of team strategy among members, which improves team performance but is hampered by linguistic heterogeneity, depends on the stage of development.