Abstract
With the rapid development of society, especially the advent of intelligent technology of life services, the ability of the elderly to adapt to modern digital life is getting weaker and weaker, the dilemma of the “digital divide” for the elderly has aroused heated public debate. In the era of aging and information superposition, in-depth study of the multi-dimensional impact of the digital divide on the elderly has become an effective content of China’s active aging strategy. Based on the micro-data of the Chinese General Social Survey in 2017, this paper uses the entropy right method to construct the digital divide index system for the elderly over 60 years of age from the perspective of essential equipment, Internet utilization degree, and Basic Internet usage skills. At the same time, this paper constructs China’s comprehensive index of active aging from three aspects: health, social participation, and guarantee of the elderly, to study the impact of the digital divide on China’s active aging. The following conclusions have been drawn: the digital divide among the elderly significantly inhibits China’s active aging. The digital divide reduces the level of physical and mental health and social participation of older persons and inhibits the level of guarantee of older persons, thus impeding their active aging. In addition, it also reduces the overall life satisfaction of the elderly. The use of the Internet, skills, and other digital technology abilities of the elderly have effectively promoted active aging. The more Internet access devices older people have, the higher their level of social participation. The higher the Internet frequency of the elderly, the healthier the body and mind. Furthermore, the greater the level of physical and mental health and social participation of older groups who use online payments. The digital divide among the elderly inhibits the process of China’s active aging, and the unique course and stage characteristics of the development of the aging of the Chinese population require us to pay full attention to the relationship between the digital divide and active aging and how to construct a “digital-friendly” aging system is an essential issue for China’s social development to consider.
Highlights
Life satisfaction can reflect the development of active aging in the elderly population from the side, so this paper verified the impact of the digital divide on active aging through life satisfaction
The regression results showed that the larger the digital divide, the less protection the elderly groups got, and the weaker their sense of physical and mental health and social participation, so that the realization of active aging was restrained, and the life satisfaction of the elderly groups weakened, which further confirms the impact of the digital divide on active aging
Every unit of the digital divide increased, the social security decreased by 0.467 units, the physical and mental health status and social participation of the elderly decreased by 0.498 points and 0.316 points, respectively, the active aging decreased by 0.335 units, and the satisfaction of the elderly in life decreased by 0.164 units
Summary
With the advent of the digital age, the world economy has radiated new vitality. The digital economy has increasingly become a new driving force for economic and social development. The increasing integration of a new generation of digital technology represented by the Internet, big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the Internet of things with the real economy has injected a new source of China’s economic growth. According to the white paper on the development of China’s digital economy (2021), in 2020, the added value of China’s digital economy will reach 39.2 trillion yuan, accounting for 38.6% of GDP
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