Underconnectedness and its implications

• In Event: Communication, Information Technologies, and Media Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): 14. Digital divide & education

Abstract

This paper examines how the reliability and quality of internet access (“under-connectedness”) affect how people use the internet. Under-connectedness has been studied largely among lower-income individuals. This is the first study of under-connectedness using a representative national sample of the U.S. population. We use the Internet and Computer Use supplement to the 2023 Current Population Survey (CPS). We find that under-connected respondents tend to be more marginal than connected respondents, with less education and much lower income. They also tend to use the internet less. However, the effect sizes of these differences are small. This is consistent with recent research showing that even in countries with near-universal internet use, the digital divide continues to play a crucial role in shaping people’s internet use.

Authors

• Grant Blank

• Bianca Christin Reisdorf, University of North Carolina-Charlotte