A very informative NPR series, Tell Me Mobile, wrapped up this week with a counter-point view on where the Digital Divide actually runs.
Traditionally, the Digital Divide is fostered by the inability--both financially and ethnically--of minority communities to keep up with digital inroads, such as Facebook, Twitter, and other widely accepted applications.
Today, in an interview with Craig Watkins, an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin, who has spent over 10 years studying young people's digital behavior, we learn that the traditional assumption may be premature.
The traditional divide, says Mr. Watkins, stems from the fact that "black and Latino youth are more likely to live in households where broadband Internet is not available."
This of course prevents these minority kids to do, online, what they would like to do; things like watching videos, playing games, and interact with friends.
Enter mobile devices, such as iPhones and other digital phones, which then become, as Mr. Watkins puts it, an "alternative gateway to those kinds of activities." Also, he adds, "Mobile device gives them more privacy, gives them more control over what they like to do with their Internet lives."
This, according to Mr. Watkins, is not necessarily a good thing. "There are certain consequences that we certainly need to be aware of and able to address. And so one of the negative things that has to be considered is, you know, how are young black and Latinos using their mobile devices? Are they using them primarily and much of the data suggests that they are using them primarily to interact with their friends, to listen to music, to play games."
Bottom line, according the Mr. Watkins' studies, seems to be that minority mobile users only use their digital devices for games, entertainment, and socializing--not for educational or civic activities.
Not that the more affluent and digitally connected sections of the population behave much better over their mobile networks, but, Mr. Watkins points out, these youth also have broadband connections at home, where they can access educational and other sites easily, and often do. The mobile minority has no such broadband avenue to travel, and so never really employ their digital connections for educational purposes.
"Given that the mobile device is something that's considered more personal, something more social, something more entertainment driven, when you don't have access to other means of the Internet, other means of a sort of digital media environment, I think it does create limited opportunities for black and Latino youth who are going online primarily via their mobile device."
"And," he adds, "I could maybe make one other point. I think what's also happening is that black and Latino youth are going online at a time where if they're living in households without laptops, without computers, that oftentimes means that maybe their parents or their guardians aren't as active online as they possibly could be."
This, Mr. Watkins suggests, drives another digital wedge between parents and children in minority households, where the kids spend many unsupervised hours online over their mobiles engaged in activities such as Facebook that their parents have not even heard about.
Food for thought.
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