Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Technology Affects Everyone Differently Depending on Types of Accessibility



Digital Divide vs. Participation Gap

Kevin Guidry expresses his thoughts pertaining to the unequal factors technology causes and what effects the diverse population of the United States encounters in his article "Digital Divide or Participation Gap? Will Mobile Affect it?". He explores two different theories, a “digital divide” and a “participation gap.” The “digital divide” states that there are major differences between those who have computers and technological devices at home opposed to those who do not. The “participation gap” goes even further by looking into the particular ways people view and use certain aspects of technology. I believe that the “participation gap” is the proper explanation for what the United States is currently experiencing throughout this technological age because even if a person does not have a computer at home, it is now extremely easy to access the Internet using other methods at many different places. Here is a chart that has an overview of Internet and cell phone use from 2010, categorized by ethnicity:


Whites have the highest percentage in each category, and Hispanics’ percentages trail closely behind Blacks. The main explanation for these results could be that Whites typically have higher incomes than minorities in America, which means that more Whites can purchase technological devices. Each ethnicity proves that it is more common for people to have cell phones than to have computers at home, but more than half of the citizens under each category do find a way to use the Internet. 


Cell Phones are Playing Larger Roles in Technological Differences Between American Citizens

Guidry’s article was released in 2007 and since then, cell phones have increasingly become an essential component of technology. According to a study done by Pew Research Center this past August, “88 percent of American adults have cell phones.” A large amount of these adults are fortunate enough to have smartphones, which provides them with access to the Internet. For those who don’t have computers in their homes, smartphones give them the opportunity to attain access to the Internet at any moment they find necessary. Unfortunately, cell phones also provide users with many problems that they have to deal with on a regular basis. The main problems include dropped calls, unwanted sales or marketing calls, unwanted spam or text messages, and slow download speeds. The occurrence of these issues are usually not often or nonexistent, but some cell phone users have to deal with these burdens multiple times a week or even worse, several times a day. Surprisingly, smartphone users encounter mobile phone problems more often than those who have ordinary cell phones. Among cell phone problems, a larger number of Blacks and Hispanics experience these problems when compared to Whites. The “participation gap” seems to mainly be divided by ethnicities because they tend to share similar characteristics involving how often and in what specific ways they access the Internet.


The Future Will Continue To Be Affected By a Participation Gap

Hopefully, Americans will eventually be able to solve all of the varying components involving citizens’ connections to technology and their understanding of it. I believe that the “participation gap” will become narrower as time goes on, but I do not believe that it will be completely resolved in the next three to five years. A few of the results from the Pew Research Center’s study will still prove to be true, while some of the results will alter to better our society. Ethnicities will still provide divisions between factors of cell phone usage, but the amount of people within each ethnicity who have cell phones will continue to increase along with the number of people who own smartphones.  Unless entirely new problems arise, mobile cell phone problems will diminish largely in the future because cell phone companies will develop different methods in order to solve these dilemmas.