Digital Divide: How Do Home Internet Access and Parental Support Affect Student Outcomes?

Jing Lei,Jingye Zhou

doi:10.3390/educ2010045

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between home Internet access/parental support and student outcomes. Survey data were collected from 1,576 middle school students in China. Data were analyzed using descriptive analysis, independent-samples T-test, and regression analysis. Results indicate that students who had home Internet access reported higher scores than those without home Internet on all three dimensions: Computer and Internet self-efficacy, Attitudes towards technology and Developmental outcomes. Home Internet access and parental support were significantly positively associated with technology self-efficacy, interest in technology, perceived importance of the Internet, and perceived impact of the Internet on learning. Findings from this study have significant implications for research and practice on how to narrow down the digital divide.

Highlights

Digital divide refers to the technology capacity gap between those who have access to rich digital information and those who have not [1], and the root of this “troubling digital gap” is the inequity of access to computers and the Internet [2]
In a study focused on five low-socioeconomic (SES) and three high-SES schools in California, Warschauer and colleagues [8] found that students in low-SES schools were heavily impacted by the sparse access to computers and the Internet at home
About half of the students (53.5%) reported that Internet access was available at home, and 83% of students reported they had access to the Internet in the school

Summary

Introduction

Digital divide refers to the technology capacity gap between those who have access to rich digital information and those who have not [1], and the root of this “troubling digital gap” is the inequity of access to computers and the Internet [2] This inequity exits both in schools and at home. In a study focused on five low-socioeconomic (SES) and three high-SES schools in California, Warschauer and colleagues [8] found that students in low-SES schools were heavily impacted by the sparse access to computers and the Internet at home These findings indicate a serious digital divide in terms of home Internet access between poor students and affluent students [9]

Methods

Results

Conclusion