Digital Habits of Users in the Post-Pandemic Context: A Study on the Transition of Mexican Internet and Media Users from the Monterrey Metropolitan Area

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the transformation of digital interactions, a development that has been growing in the last decade. Digital platforms have become indispensable in the institutional communication of public and private organizations. The magnitude of this change was evident during the pandemic at a time when several countries implemented social distancing measures to contain the contagion. This situation caused a certain degree of user dependence on information and communication technologies. The objective of this research is to analyze the time of use, the changes, and habits of digital consumption at the beginning and during the COVID-19 pandemic in the metropolitan area of Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico. Access to both social networks and digital entertainment platforms was examined during the period in which Internet users had resumed a large part of face-to-face activities, and 1500 questionnaires were conducted considering the current data of the population of the urban area according to what was reported by the INEGI (National Institute of Statistics and Geography). The results indicate that after COVID-19, a digital transformation was accelerated, and, in that period, social media helped to build trust according to the users consulted in the Monterrey metropolitan area. However, trust was given at an interpersonal level due to motivations such as the prior user relationships in offline spaces and not so much because of the institutional campaigns that were behind the digital transformation.