Explaining caste-based digital divide in India

With the increasing importance of information and communication technologies in access to basic services like education and health, the question of digital divide based on caste assumes importance in India where large socioeconomic disparities persist between different caste groups. Studies on caste-based digital inequality are still scanty in India. Using nationally representative survey data, this paper analyzes the first-level digital divide (ownership of computer and access to the Internet) and the second-level digital divide (individuals skills to use computer and the Internet) between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others. Further, this paper identifies the caste-based differences in socioeconomic factors that contribute to the digital divide between these groups using a non-linear decomposition method. The results show that there exists large first-level and second-level digital divide between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others in India. The non-linear decomposition results indicate that caste-based digital divide in India is rooted in historical socioeconomic deprivation of disadvantaged caste groups. More than half of the caste-based digital gap is attributable to differences in educational attainment and income between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others. Findings of this study highlight the urgent need for addressing educational and income inequality between the different caste groups in India in order to bridge the digital divide.     

Exploring the Determinants of Artificial Intelligence (AI) Literacy: Digital Divide,Computational Thinking,Cognitive Absorption

To effectively utilize artificial intelligence (AI)-based technologies such as ChatGPT and realize their novel ethical issues, individuals must have a variety of knowledge and skills about AI. Such knowledge and skills have led to the emergence of AI literacy. Despite the importance of AI literacy in everyday life, little is known about its determinants. To better understand the determinants of AI literacy, we attempted to build a research model relying on previous research and different theoretical frameworks. The model incorporated digital divide, cognitive absorption, and computational thinking. As a major finding from the current study, computational thinking was found to be a significant determinant of AI literacy, which facilitate using, recognizing, and evaluating AI-based technologies. Moreover, we found out that individuals with physical access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) are more expected to use and recognize AI. Also, motivation and skills in using ICTs enable individuals to better evaluate the outcomes of AI-based technologies. The findings also showed that convenient access to ICTs contributes to a deep involvement with AI-based technologies in the use. Further, individuals with higher motivation and skills to use AI technologies are likely to have a pleasant experience after using these technologies.     

Does the digital divide matter? Factors and conditions that promote ICT literacy

Individuals’ computer skills have long been noteworthy for both education and the labor market. Although the support provided through curricula in schools develops these skills to a certain extent, digital divide still exists for individuals with different socio-demographic characteristics. The concept of digital divide, used to define individuals who do not have equal access to digital technologies, has started to be seen as a determining factor for digital competencies with its expanding scope. The current study aims to take a perspective to investigate the effect of socio-demographic variables, which may cause digital divide, on students' ICT literacy. With this study, it is sought to explain the effect of current inequalities regarding digital access on students' ICT skills. To this end, the socio-demographic characteristics of the students in the sample of Korea and Chile from the participating countries of the International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) were examined in the context of ICT literacy. The characteristics of the models created were compared for both countries. While parents’ level of education variable stands out for the Chilean model, the internet connection variable is remarkable for the Korean model. It is anticipated that the findings of the research will contribute to understanding the dynamics of the digital divide and its possible consequences, and can be a source for preventive policy steps to be developed.     

Mapping users’ perspectives and outlining social impacts from digitalization of terrestrial TV in Brazil

The digital divide has numerous aspects and is as dynamic as the technology industry is able to develop and disseminate new ICTs and services, thus increasing or creating new gaps among the more advanced societies and those still hampered by social and economic problems. In developing countries the diffusion of new technologies is often hindered by factors such as insufficient income, deficient infrastructure, cultural barriers and lack of information. Brazil is no exception to that rule, and all information and communication technologies (ICT) diffusion surveys undertaken to date confirm the trend that digital exclusion is following the dreadful pattern of social exclusion. The income disparities in Brazil are very severe and, also due to the country’s huge territory and complex geographical and cultural formations, a technological innovation is seldom capable of reaching the population as a whole and benefiting the entire society. One outstanding exception is the terrestrial (free-to-air) TV, which, after about 50 years since its introduction, has reached an adoption rate of more than 90%, and now covers the whole country, with enormous sociocultural consequences. In view of this, and with the objective of addressing the problem of digital exclusion, the Brazilian Government has devised the deployment of digital terrestrial television—DTT—as a singular opportunity to reduce the digital divide and to promote the access of the population to interactive and citizenship services through an already familiar interface, thus avoiding or reducing cultural constraints and illiteracy barriers usually posed by other ICTs. This study undertakes a comprehensive discussion of that policy and its effects, and provides some data to support the strategy: the results of two interrelated studies; one that maps TV users’ characteristics and expectations regarding digital TV, and another that models the social network effects on the diffusion of DTT into Brazilian society and the users’ behavior when facing the new media, namely, an agent-based modeling and simulation—ABMS. The model uses the mapping information as input to test some hypothetical scenarios in the diffusion process, so as to identify factors that affect the overall diffusion process. All these studies are in the scope of a broader and deeper methodology for ex ante analysis.     

Potential pitfalls of smart city development: A study on parking mobile applications (apps) in Hong Kong

Smart cities are built upon information and communication technologies (ICTs) to enable a broad range of advanced services. Through a comprehensive literature review, this study identified four pitfalls brought by the pervasive application of ICT, including information insecurity, privacy leakage, information islands, and digital divide. Therefore, a questionnaire survey together with 27 interviews was conducted in Hong Kong to investigate how the public perceived these pitfalls within the context of mobile apps providing real-time parking information which form a major part of smart mobility. System insecurity and privacy leakage were found to arouse worries among the app-users while their awareness of protecting personal data was found to have room for improvement. Islands of real-time parking information occur as a result of the lack of collaboration among private carpark operators. Digital divide existed widely among the disadvantaged groups and the problem cannot be solved by mere provision of ICT facilities. Overall, technologies alone cannot make a city smart or smarter. It is the suitable way in which ICTs are used to serve all citizens that matters.     

巾帼风采

为鼓励更多年轻女性成为ICT技术领域的专业人才,ITU将今年"世界电信与信息社会日"的主题定为"信息通信与女性(Women and Girls in ICT)",并表示,期望世界各地的女性均能全面应用ICT,从信息和知识中获取力量,了解自身权利并把握数字机遇。     

The influence of social and cultural factors on mothers’ domestication of household ICTs – Experiences of Chinese and Korean women

ICTs such as television, the Internet and mobile phones are assuming a growing presence within the modern homestead and are having an indelible impact on family dynamics and parenting. While gender studies have sought to understand ICT domestication from the perspective of mothers, the influence of social and cultural factors on the adoption and appropriation of ICTs has not been as widely studied. So as to better explicate the influence of socio-cultural factors on mothers’ domestication of ICTs, this article studies the experiences of mothers in China and South Korea and compares its findings against studies of ICT domestication by mothers in other countries. Based on ethnographic interviews with mothers in media-rich families in Beijing, Shanghai and Seoul, the article explores how mothers incorporate ICTs into their household routines and how they utilise ICTs as they fulfil their maternal duties of managing the home, coordinating schedules, fostering family interaction and supervising their children. It also pays particular attention to how they oversee their children’s ICT use. The article finds that cultural conceptions of motherhood and maternal responsibility, the premium placed on academic achievement by children, as well as the two societies’ highly positive outlook on technology, greatly influence how Chinese and Korean mothers use and supervise their children’s use of ICTs. It also finds that the mothers are creative in deploying ICTs in coordinating schedules with, disciplining and monitoring their children, but also find the perpetual mothering which is enabled by always-on ICT-mediated connections to be burdensome and stressful.     

Bridging the digital divide among low income urban communities. Leveraging use of Community Technology Centers

To fully leverage the availability of the internet services in Kenya, all the citizens need to be able to access and use the internet and related services. The availability of 4G networks, cyber cafés and fiber connectivity in most residential areas of Nairobi has allowed many Nairobi residents to be part of its information-based society. But, as with the other existing social inequalities in Nairobi, many people residing in the city’s low-income areas lack access to the internet. This has a negative impact on the residents’ prospects as the governments and businesses are increasingly delivering their services online. Using a pre-tested questionnaire, data were collected from five hundred and fifty respondents on their internet access and digital literacy skills among the residents of the Mathare Slum. From the survey, the study found existence of limited digital literacy skills and lack of internet access among the residents of the Mathare Slum. The study then used the Community Technology Centers (CTCs) intervention approach to narrowing the digital divide by setting up a CTC in the Mathare Slum to offer free community internet access and digital literacy skills training. Eight cohorts, each of eighteen residents, were offered free digital literacy training for five weeks and free unlimited internet access for four months. The study then evaluated the trainees’ internet usage continuance intentions after four months of continued use of the internet at the CTC. The results indicate that perceived enjoyment, perceived usefulness, internet self-efficacy, and confirmation of expectations all significantly influence the participants’ satisfaction with use of the internet. The results also show that continuance intentions of the participants from low income household to continue using internet beyond the CTC can be predicted by perceived service cost, satisfaction, internet self-efficacy and perceived usefulness. The study demonstrates the effectiveness of CTCs as an intervention approach and a replicable model that can be used to bridge the urban digital divide among low income urban communities for the development of an all-inclusive information-based society. Implications and recommendations for policy, practice and research are provided.     

Africa and the digital divide

The digital divide is a phenomenon linked not only to the topic of access to the Internet, but also to the one of usage and usage benefit. In this paper we take a look at the global digital divide concerning Africa, we analyze the situation with the help of macro-data and by discussing specific examples (Ghana, South Africa). We also address suggestions that have been made for closing the global digital divide and point out that such solutions require more fundamental changes of society and cannot be achieved by technology alone.     

A new educational pattern in response to new technologies and sustainable development. Enlightening ICT skills for youth employability in the European Union

The so-called fourth revolution is underway and its impact is appreciated in societies and in the way of life of people, particularly due to its effects on the labor market. The disruption generated by the fast changes point out to the immediacy of the needed changes in higher education for responding the new and changing world. The millenarians or digital natives are already used to living with technology, but the technological changes are so fast that if they do not prepare to face them, they will become obsolete soon. Hence the importance of continuous training and the need for institutions and companies to promote training courses for their employees. The higher education institutions have a key role on the promotion of knowledge and on the innovation, but this new scenario is an unexpected challenge that is difficult to face. Incorporating teaching of information and communications technology in universities within the curriculum, as a cross-training topic, is a difficult but necessary challenge for preparing students for success in labor market. In this paper, the importance of training in ICTs to get a job is raised. An empirical study with EUROSTAT data is carried out and is limited to young people between 16 and 24?years old. Structural Equation Modelling is the applied method. The results indicate that informal ICTs training favors employment and training in computer management. The conclusions point to the need to providing channels of self-training or informal personal training to fit the needs and temporal and spatial availability of each.     

Determinants of Internet skills,uses and outcomes. A systematic review of the second- and third-level digital divide

Recently, several digital divide scholars suggested that a shift is needed from a focus on binary Internet access (first-level digital divide) and Internet skills and use (second-level digital divide) to a third-level digital divide in which the tangible outcomes of Internet use are highlighted. A plethora of studies have been conducted to identify determinants of digital divides. Unfortunately, there is a lack of consistency in the terminology used. Moreover, terms are often not theoretically grounded. Therefore, we conducted a systematic literature review of digital divide determinants. The results show that the third-level digital divide was underexposed. The primary focus is on Internet use. More importantly, the identified determinants show that digital divide research is largely limited to sociodemographic and socioeconomic determinants.     

“Communities of strangerhoods?”: Internet,mobile phones and the changing nature of radio cultures in South Africa

This article analyses the role of new media technologies in transforming radio practices in South Africa in terms of institutional cultures and audience engagement. With emphasis on the Internet and mobile phones, the paper focuses on three radio stations – Safm, Talk Radio 702, and Bush Radio. Drawing on theories of public spheres and theories of publics, the paper argues that ICTs have expanded communicative radio spaces and transformed the nature of audience engagement. Through these expanded spaces, radio stations increasingly view their listeners as publics rather than merely audiences, meaning that listeners now produce, circulate and share information in ways that allow them to organise themselves into a public around radio texts. While the argument in this paper has acknowledged the positive role of ICTs in expanding discursive spaces and transforming radio publics, realities of the digital divide in South Africa are not ignored.     

Geodemographic classifications, the digital divide and understanding customer take-up of new technologies

The imperatives of social cohesion make it necessary to consider the highly variable characteristics of users alongside the design and implementation of IT networks and services. In this context much has been written on the so-called ‘digital divide’ in society. Recent ESRC-funded research at UCL has illustrated how it is simplistic to think of the impacts of new information and communication technologies (ICTs) in terms of a single, or even small number of, ‘digital divides’. As developments in what has been termed the ‘e-society’ reach wider and more generalised audiences, so it becomes appropriate to think of digital media as having wider-ranging but differentiated impacts upon consumer transactions, information gathering and citizen participation. This paper describes the development of a detailed, nationwide household classification based on levels of awareness of different ICTs, levels of use of ICTs, and their perceived impacts upon human capital formation and the quality of life. It illustrates how geodemographic classification makes it possible to provide context for detailed case studies, and hence identify how policy might best improve both the quality and degree of society’s access to ICTs. We have provided a more detailed overview of the methodology elsewhere [1, 2] and here we also illustrate how the classification may be used to investigate a range of regional and sub-regional policy issues. A particularly innovative aspect of this classification is the Web resource hosted at www.spatial-literacy.org/esocietyprofiler. This site makes it possible to look at the classification system, aggregated to unit postcodes, across Great Britain. Users can look at national distributions for each of the groups and types in the classification, and offer feedback as to whether the classification appears to work for any locality.     

Digital Divides From Access to Activities: Comparing Mobile and Personal Computer Internet Users

Digital inequality can take many forms. Four forms studied here are access to Internet, use of different devices, extent of usage, and engagement in different Internet activities. However, it is not clear whether sociodemographic factors, or devices, are more influential in usage and activities. Results from an unfamiliar context show that there are significant sociodemographic influences on access, device, usage, and activities, and differences in activities by device type and usage. While sociodemographic differences are more influential, device type can increase likelihood of use for some “capital enhancing” activities, but only for a computer. Thus, although mobile Internet is available for those on the wrong side of the digital divide, these users do not engage in many activities, decreasing potential benefits.     

Digital inequalities and implications for social inequalities: A study of Internet penetration amongst university students in South Africa

International and national data sources confirm the limited access to the Internet in South Africa. However, there is a need to study how this limited access is distributed amongst population groups in the country. This study investigates the pattern of Internet access amongst university students in South Africa. University students are a relevant population group for studying technology penetration; this population is a generation born in the current era of digital revolution, they are presumably early adopters of technology and are adept in using them. A survey conducted in ten South African universities reveals that beyond publicly available access on campuses – with its attendant constraints, personal/household Internet access is a challenge and it reflects a pattern of inequalities in South Africa. Bearing in mind that social and economic exclusion is the biggest challenge for South Africa, this study reveals that digital inequalities amongst students replicate the pattern of social inequalities in the country. This exacerbates existing social inequalities, specifically amongst university students in South Africa, with certain categories of students being disproportionately disadvantaged.     

Optimizing Costs in Workplace Instant Messaging Use

Instant messaging (IM) has the potential to be a powerful collaborative workplace communication tool. As this information and communication technology (ICT) becomes more diffused at work, it is important to consider how the workers will cope with yet another communication option. Using a cost-minimization perspective, this proposition-building piece links three types of costs associated with IM use, delay, access, and error, with two salient workplace concerns, productivity and communication overload. The delay costs associated with IM use are considerably lower than with other ICTs. While increased use of IM can enhance productivity, it might also lead to perceptions of overload. IM access costs include organizational access, interruptions, user experiences, user differences, and generational differences—variables that influence one another and can lead to either outcome. Error costs come in two forms: single-channel factors and message quality issues. These likely lead to increased communication overload and decreased productivity. Combining IM with other ICTs is a likely moderator in this relationship and might help overcome the single-channel factors. The resulting eight propositions and theoretical model provide a predictive framework to focus future workplace IM use studies.      

A Study of the Effects of the Current InternationalSettlement of Internet

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Empirical study of a sequence of access to Internet use in Ecuador

Ecuador is a country that represents the efforts that a few countries in the Latin American and the Caribbean region are making on infrastructures, regulations and policies that are favorable towards the use of the Internet. However, although the digital divide in its most basic form (physical access and use) is closing with respect to developed countries, a new, more complex digital divide is moving forward, and is related to the socio-economic advantages of the Internet. This study, which used a random sample stratified by provinces and which comprised 3754 respondents representing the secondary school students in Ecuador, had as objectives: (a) to verify the relationship and sequence among the different levels to access the Internet found on secondary school students; and (b) to verify to what degree the student’s family status influenced the different levels of Internet access. Through the empirical analysis of a structural model, the results showed a sequence between the relationships found among the different levels of Internet access, as well as the cumulative effect of the technical resources and levels of digital literacy on the academic use of the Internet. Likewise, it was observed that the influence of the student’s family status lost strength as the level of Internet access increased.     

Technology priorities for the White House

What issues related to technology will the next US President confront? Vice President Al Gore and Texas Governor George W. Bush. Both offer up glowing words about the social, political, and economic wonders wrought by technology. Both promise, if elected, to keep that spirit of innovation alive. Regardless of who wins in November, the next Administration will confront a raft of technology-related problems. Some of these, like biotechnology and on-line privacy, have only begun to be taken up in policy circles. In more mature areas, like energy and air quality, and telecommunications, Federal rules may have unexpected downstream effects. And in issues that cross national borders, such as global warming, the so-called digital divide, and military policy, whatever path the new government takes will likely influence the course of events worldwide. Some of the main technological issues that will confront the new president are discussed including human genetics, the deepening digital divide, global warming, air pollution, electricity deregulation, privacy of information on computer networks, a national missile defence system, and telecommunication competition     

Delving into the digital divide

The author examines the question of whether the digital divide due to poverty or an effect of underlying social and economic conditions. The digital divide is a major concern to technology companies, because it bars billions of people from buying their products. But it is difficult for industry to tap this market potential without addressing poverty as an issue. Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has publicly stated that he does not see the rural poor in developing countries as a significant business opportunity