Socio-Economic Aspects of Information Deployment: Causes and Consequences

Abstract

This paper provides a review of literature discussing the relationship between information communications technology (ICT) and low-income individuals. It seeks to identify ways in which economic class status impacts ICT engagement among low-income individuals, and to assess how class status impacts the attitudes of external interlocutors towards low-income ICT users. The study employs a three-part analysis, comprising a review of the information poverty model of information behavior and its critics, a review of literature discussing the deployment and impacts of information surveillance, and a review of literature assessing libraries as a site for closing information gaps. It presents a body of information which argues that low-income individuals interact with ICT within a complex cultural, legal and economic framework, and presents possibilities for further interdisciplinary investigation of this topic.