How technology infrastructure across states structures healthcare access during Covid

• In Event: 50462 - Section on Science, Knowledge, and Technology Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 10: SKAT and the State

Abstract

The ability to access and manipulate information provides new avenues to gain power (Gee and Ford 2011). Because technology and digital tools structure subsequent trajectories of resource access, technology gap has become a primary form of adversity. The current research examines how this new avenue of stratification divides our usage of healthcare services, in a time of pervasive digitality during Covid.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the digital divide [Lythreatis et al. 2022]. During Covid, in-person contact was restricted, and the reliance on technology and internet to communicate, make appointments, and solve problems increased. Therefore, the researcher speculates that internet access matters more for healthcare access and utilization during the pandemic. The fundamental cause theorists have contrasted the associations between SES and health when recourses theoretically matter for health intervention and when they don’t (Phelan and Link 2005; Beckfield, Olafsdottir, and Bakhtiari 2013). Drawing from this line, this paper hypothesizes a stronger association between internet coverage and healthcare utilization, contextualized in a requirement for electric communication and information obtaining.

The present paper operationalizes levels of digital reliance as the stage of the pandemic and investigates empirical support of resource gradation (operationalized as quality internet coverage) in healthcare access. Ordinal logistic regressions at the state level are used to determine if healthcare-internet associations before and during the pandemic are significantly different. In another word, this project analyzes the moderation effects of the degree of digitalization (during the pandemic vs. other times) on how internet access affects collective healthcare utilization. The project accesses information about speed internet coverage and technology subscription (e.g., percentage of households that have broadband infrastructure) via the American Community Survey (ACS) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Author

• Junlan Ren, University of Connecticut