Icakzkgtj
•
0 likes•736 views
This document discusses social exclusion through lack of internet awareness, adoption and use in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. It finds that awareness, adoption and frequent use of the internet follows a process, with barriers increasing at each stage. Age, education level, economic wellbeing and living in urban areas determine progress through these stages. Survey results show that half or more of people in each country have not heard of the internet, and most of those aware do not use it regularly. Lack of internet access reinforces social exclusion, particularly for the less privileged. Further research is needed to understand barriers and potential interventions to increase internet inclusion.
More Related Content
Viewers also liked
Viewers also liked (9)
Similar to Icakzkgtj
Similar to Icakzkgtj (20)
More from Katy Pearce
More from Katy Pearce (20)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (20)
Icakzkgtj
- 1. Social Exclusion through Internet Awareness, Adoption, and Use: The Cases of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan Dr. Katy Pearce, University of Washington @katypearce Dr. Ron Rice 1 University of California, Santa Barbara
- 2. 2
- 3. Theoretical Orientation • Social exclusion – Individuals/communities systematically blocked from rights, opportunities, and resources that are normally available and key to social integration (Sen, 2000). • Digital divide/inequality – Divide between people in information and communication technology awareness, adoption, ownership, use, and skill, usually based on socio- demographic and socio-economic factors. 3
- 4. Digital Divide • Awareness -> Adoption -> Use • Process or stage-based digital divide – Each stage requires successfully achieving the previous. – The barriers become greater at each stage. – Determinants or “barriers” in this study: age, economic wellbeing, educational attainment, urbanness. 4
- 5. Methods • Spring 2011 face-to-face nationally representative survey in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan • N = 1800 in each country 5
- 6. Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Aware of Internet 80% 55% 44% Of total, Adopted Internet 50% 20% 24% Of total, Use Internet Never 66% 89% 90% Less than monthly 2% 2% 2% Monthly 3% 3% 3% Weekly 10% n/a n/a 6 Daily 19% 7% 5%
- 7. Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan 80% 55% 50% 44% 29% 24% 20% 7% 5% Aware Adopt Frequent use 7
- 8. Analysis • Structural equation model • Fit test adequate Variance explained Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Awareness 13% 16% 16% Adoption 33% 35% 25% Use 49% 40% 20% 8
- 9. • Age Aware • Education • Urbanness • Age Adopt • Education • Economic wellbeing • Urbanness • Urbanness Use • Education • Age • Economic wellbeing 9
- 10. Discussion • What is occurring when half of a country doesn’t know that the Internet exists in 2011? • In Central Asia, despite programs to increase technology use, few are aware of, adopt, or use the Internet, with only the most privileged doing so. • Social exclusion is reaffirmed and amplified with lack of access to the Internet. 10
- 11. Next Steps • What are the perceived barriers? • What, if any, intervention could increase Internet awareness, adoption, and use? • Does it matter? – Yes, exclusion from informational and communication technologies has inequality implications individually and globally. 11
- 12. THANK YOU 12
- 13. EXTRA SLIDES 13
- 14. Aware Adopt Use age econ edu urbanness 14
- 15. .27 .60 .31 .58 .43 .31 Aware Adopt Use -.08 -.17 -.20 -.10 -.20 -.24 ns -.06 -.14 -.18 .07 -.05 ns -.08 .15 -.06 .10 .16 .06 .07 -.07 .20 .13 .12 .08 ns -.10 .29 ns .15 .04 -.07 ns -.22 -.23 -.16 age econ edu urbanness 15
- 16. Results • Biggest contributors to lack of awareness that the Internet exists as well as having adopted it are region, age, and education. • The drop off between awareness and adoption is also one of age, being urban, having greater education and in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, wealth. • Frequent users of the Internet in all three countries are younger, urban, more educated, and in Tajikistan wealthier. 16
Editor's Notes
- A social exclusion and digital divide framework is applied to understanding the influences on and relations among awareness, adoption, and (frequent) use of the Internet in three former Soviet republics facing different challenges, mostly related to poor economic conditions. Survey data from nationally representative samples in each country fit a model predicting that age, economic condition, education and urban/rural region all generally influence each of the three Internet stages, with a few factors disappearing as significant in subsequent stages. Thus, in countries with poor economic conditions, Internet digital divides may occur at several stages, all susceptible to sociodemographic factors, and cumulatively affect frequent use as well as potential benefits from such use. Some argue that the digital divide is over. But this is just not the case.In Central Asia, despite a relatively high level of literacy and educational attainment as well as decades of policies, programs, and aid projects designed to increase technology use, Internet use is still low.This region is especially important to study because some of the countries are moving close to 'failed state' status and without a doubt, face great poverty.
- Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are nations facing many challenges, especially related to poverty. While these challenges are not new, as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan were the poorest republics in the Soviet Union (Heyat, 2004), the safety net that existed in the Soviet period is now gone. Kyrgyzstan, the world’s 31st most failed state (out of 177), and the most unstable state in the Former Soviet Union (Fund for Peace, 2011), has experienced great upheavals in recent years, including a 2010 presidential overthrow and interethnic strife, resulting in hundreds of deaths. However, 2010 was tame compared to 2005 during which the 2010 president's predecessor was overthrown (Marat, 2011). Furthermore, many Kyrgyzstanis (40%) live in poverty, exacerbating the political challenges that the country faces. Tajikistan, a state “on the road to failure” (International Crisis Group, 2009), 39th most failed state (Fund for Peace, 2011), and one of “the world’s least developed states” (International Crisis Group, 2009), experiences widespread and persistent poverty because of low productivity Digital Divide in Central Asia, p-4 and demand for labor (Babajanian, 2006). Furthermore, poor governance and structural inequalities restrain access to economic resources (especially land ownership) and opportunities, important public and health services and social and political participation for poorer Tajikistanis (Babajanian, 2006). Most Tajikistanis live hand-to-mouth (Central Intelligence Agency, 2011b; Fouroughi, 2011; International Crisis Group, 2009). Kazakhstan, on the other hand, with a great deal of oil wealth, is in much better economic condition than its neighbors are. Kazakhstan has considerable economic resources due to its significant oil fields. Nonetheless, oil wealth has allowed Kazakhstan's president to build a strong and unchecked presidency. While officially Kazakhstan talks about reform and democratization, in practice there is little commitment to these goals (Dave, 2011).
- Social exclusion is a concept used in international development to describe social disadvantage, specifically of processes in which individuals and entire communities of people are systematically blocked from rights, opportunities and resources that are normally available to members of society and which are key to social integration (Sen, 2000). This is a more complex concept than poverty, as social exclusion looks at unequal access of individuals and groups to participating fully in economic, social, and political life (Duffy, 1998; Gordon et al., 2000; Kenyon, Lyonsa, & Rafferty, 2002). The relationship between social exclusion and lack of access to information and communication technologies creates a cycle of exclusion: social exclusion leads to greater digital exclusion, which then perpetuates and exacerbates the social exclusion (e.g., Chen, Boase, & Wellman, 2002; Holloway, 2005; Servon, 2002). Furthermore, some argue that access to technology can – and is necessary to – reduce social exclusion (Warschauer, 2004, p. 30). The digital divide originally described the socioeconomic gap between computer users and non-users in the U.S. The conceptual definition of digital divide varies greatly depending on how differences in access, adoption and use are defined and measured (DiMaggio, Hargittai, Celeste, & Shafer, 2004; Dolnicar, 2011; Gunkel, 2003; Hilbert, 2011; Sassi, 2005; Selwyn, 2004), but has been expanded to encompass any divide between people (organizations, social groups, or geopolitical entities) in their communication technology awareness, adoption/ownership, use, and skill, typically based on socio-demographic factors.
- Talk about each of these….
- In all three countries, age (H1), education (H3), and region (H4) predicted awareness. Economic consumption ability (H2) weakly predicted awareness in Kazakhstan, did not predict awareness in Tajikistan, and was negatively significantly related to awareness in Kyrgyzstan. In all three countries, age (H5) and education (H7) predicted adoption. In Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, economic consumption ability (H6) also predicted adoption, but in Tajikistan Digital Divide in Central Asia, p-14 there was no relationship between the two variables. Region (H8) predicted adoption in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan as well, but not significantly in Tajikistan. In all three countries, awareness strongly positively predicted adoption (H9). Age (H10), education (H12), and region (H13) all predicted use. But only in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan did economic consumption ability (H11) predict use. Further, adoption strongly predicted use (H14).