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Why the Institutional Access Digital Divide Might Be More Significant than the Home Broadband Divide

Why the Institutional Access Digital Divide Might Be More Significant than the Home Broadband Divide

Christopher McConnell, Joseph Straubhaar
Copyright: © 2016 |Pages: 20
ISBN13: 9781466687400|ISBN10: 1466687401|EISBN13: 9781466687417
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-8740-0.ch005
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MLA

McConnell, Christopher, and Joseph Straubhaar. "Why the Institutional Access Digital Divide Might Be More Significant than the Home Broadband Divide." Handbook of Research on Comparative Approaches to the Digital Age Revolution in Europe and the Americas, edited by Brasilina Passarelli, et al., IGI Global, 2016, pp. 56-75. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-4666-8740-0.ch005

APA

McConnell, C. & Straubhaar, J. (2016). Why the Institutional Access Digital Divide Might Be More Significant than the Home Broadband Divide. In B. Passarelli, J. Straubhaar, & A. Cuevas-Cerveró (Eds.), Handbook of Research on Comparative Approaches to the Digital Age Revolution in Europe and the Americas (pp. 56-75). IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-4666-8740-0.ch005

Chicago

McConnell, Christopher, and Joseph Straubhaar. "Why the Institutional Access Digital Divide Might Be More Significant than the Home Broadband Divide." In Handbook of Research on Comparative Approaches to the Digital Age Revolution in Europe and the Americas, edited by Brasilina Passarelli, Joseph Straubhaar, and Aurora Cuevas-Cerveró, 56-75. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 2016. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-4666-8740-0.ch005

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Abstract

Digital-inclusion policy in the United States has historically emphasized home broadband access as both its policy priority and goal. Supplying households with broadband access may not do much to improve the ability of individuals to make meaningful use of the Internet, however, since it provides Internet access with little social context beyond the family. Drawing on Bourdieu's concepts of disposition, habitus, and multiple forms of capital, this paper endeavors to situate Internet use in its broader social context and explores the importance of institutional access, Internet use at work or school, in developing the dispositions and competencies needed to use the Internet in instrumental ways, such as applying for educational programs or communicating with governments. Through descriptive statistics, it identifies which segments of a US city lack institutional access, and, using multivariate analysis, it highlights the role institutional access plays in developing these abilities and its role in further inequality.

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