Online But Still Divided - Inequality in Private Internet Use in Germany

Abstract

Die Dis cus si on Pape rs die nen einer mög lichst schnel len Ver brei tung von neue ren For schungs arbei ten des ZEW. Die Bei trä ge lie gen in allei ni ger Ver ant wor tung der Auto ren und stel len nicht not wen di ger wei se die Mei nung des ZEW dar.Dis cus si on Papers are inten ded to make results of ZEW research prompt ly avai la ble to other eco no mists in order to encou ra ge dis cus si on and sug gesti ons for revi si ons. The aut hors are sole ly respon si ble for the con tents which do not neces sa ri ly repre sent the opi ni on of the ZEW.Download this ZEW Discussion Paper from our ftp server:ftp://ftp.zew.de/pub/zew-docs/dp/dp10042.pdf Non-technical summaryAlthough information and communication technologies (ICT) have diffused into all economic and private sectors during the last decade, large disparities still exist.The disparities between individuals with regard to their access and use of new technologies are facets of the so-called digital divide. Until today, research on the digital divide has mainly focused on the access decision of individuals, that is on gaps between those who do and those who do not have access to ICT (first-level digital divide), and less on differences in usage patterns (second-level digital divide).In this paper, we investigate inequalities in internet use behaviour for the year 2004.Our analysis is based on the German ALLBUS data set which allows us to consider specific individual attitudes and preferences towards ICT. We focus on two different aspects: First, we estimate the impact of socio-economic factors on the internet access decision (first-level digital divide). Second, we analyse the determinants of the intensity of internet use and the frequency of various internet activities, such as downloading from the internet and creating web pages (second-level digital divide).Comparing the determinants of the first-and the second-level digital divide, our empirical results show two important patterns: First, socio-economic characteristics, like education, age and migration explain inequalities in internet access, while for the second-level digital divide, socio-economic factors hardly seem to play a role.Second, preferences and attitudes regarding new technologies as well as peer effects turn out to be important for both. Abstract Das Wichtigste in KürzeIn this analysis, we compare the determinants of the first-level and the second-level digital divide for private internet use in Germany. Our work offers three important innovations. First, we use the exact weekly duration of internet use to explain inequalities in internet intensity, explicitly controlling for non-users. Secondly, we use the frequencies of five different internet applications to further investigate the determinants of the second-level digital divide. Thirdly, we estimate selection models to control for unobserved characteristics of all individuals. Comparing the determinants of the first-and second-level digital divide shows that socio-economic characteristics (age, education, migration) explain inequa...

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