Home Internet Use In
Low-Income Families:
Frequency, Nature, and
Correlates of early Internet Use in the HomeNetToo Project
Linda A. Jackson
Gretchen Barbatsis
Frank Biocca
Yong Zhao
Alexander von Eye
Hiram E. Fitzgerald
Michigan State University
HomeNetToo is an NSF-funded project designed to
understand the antecedents and consequences of home Internet use among
low-income families. In this report the
results of the first six-months of server-logged measures of Internet use, and
survey and demographic measures are presented, along with ethnographic accounts
of participants' experiences with the Internet. Findings indicate that Web activities are more popular than
e-mail, and that race, age, and education influence the frequency of Internet
use. Participants' descriptions of
their experiences with the Internet speak to the importance of universal access
and the need to design technology better adapted to the user.
KEYWORDS: Digital divide, Internet use
APPROXIMATE WORD COUNT: 7900
SECTION: Alternate Track: Global Community
Linda A. Jackson
Department of Psychology
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824
517-353-8690
HomeNetToo is a research project funded by the
National Science Foundation (NSF-ITR, #0085348) to investigate the antecedents
and consequences of Internet use by families on the "other side" of
the digital divide.1 In December 2000, computers and Internet
service were provided to 90 low-income families in the midwestern U.S. who
agreed to have their Internet use continuously server-logged, and to complete
surveys at several points during an 18-month trial. This report focuses on the first 6 months of home Internet use by
adult family members, many of whom were first-time users.2 Specifically, it focuses on the
frequency and nature of Internet use, demographic correlates of use, and
quantitative and ethnographic accounts of experiences with the Internet.
The Carnegie Mellon University HomeNet project served as
a model for HomeNetToo (1). Until now,
it was the only research project that automatically logged frequency and nature
of home Internet use. Findings from the
first HomeNet study (1995-1996, 48 families) indicated the people used the
Internet about 1 hour/week in 2 sessions, visited 2 domains, and sent less than
one e-mail/week (0.47). Listserv and
newsgroup activity was infrequent. Comparable data for the HomeNet Study 2
(1998-1999; 216 families) have yet to be reported (2). Other findings from the project indicated
the variety of ways that people use the Internet at home, summarized by the
researchers as follows: "People
use the Internet for pleasure: to communicate with family, friends, and
strangers, to track sports and popular culture, to listen to music, to play
games, and to pursue specialized interests.
These pleasurable uses supplement and, for many people, are more
important than the practical uses of the Internet for jobs, school, and
shopping" (homenet.andrew.cmu.edu/progress/).
Two
other large-scale research projects have investigated how the
"average" American uses the Internet at home. Both are based on self-reported Internet
use. The Stanford University study,
released in early 2000, used a national probability sample of the general U.S.
population and Internet technology (InterSurvey) to administer surveys to both
users and nonusers (3). Based on the
responses of 4,113 adults (2,689 households), findings indicated that
approximately 66% of users reported using the Internet less than 5 hours/week. The most common use was to obtain
information (products, travel, hobbies, and general information; 100% of
users), followed by e-mail (90%).
Entertainment was a distant third (33%), followed by shopping online
(25%) and chat (20%), the latter activity dominated by "under 30"
users. Demographic characteristics
explained differences in access to the Internet, but not in its use, leading
the researchers to conclude: "once people are connected to the Net they
hardly differ in how much they use it and what they use it for, except for a
drop off after age 65." However,
statistics on demographic characteristics by amount and type of Internet use
were not provided, nor was information about refusal rates, which are likely to
be higher among nonusers than users.
In late 2000, UCLA published
its first Internet report (4), which was based on random digit dial (RDD) phone
interviews of 2,096 households of users and nonusers. UCLA researchers found that, on average, people spent 9.42 hours
per week on the Internet, with time online increasing with Internet
experience. For example, users with
more than 4 years of experience used the Internet 16.2 hours/week whereas those
with less than one year of experience used it 6.1 hours/week. The most frequent Internet activities were
Web surfing or browsing (82% of users) and e-mail (82%), followed by finding
hobby information (57%), reading news (57%), finding entertainment information
(54%), and buying online (52%). Less than
half of the interviewees reported using the Internet for travel information
(46%), instant messaging (40%), medical information (37%), or playing games
(33%). As in the Stanford report and
numerous other surveys (5, 6), education and income were related to access to
the Internet, although even the least educated and lowest income groups
reported using the Internet; 31% of adult respondents with less than a
high-school education, and 41% with incomes under $15K were Internet
users. However, as in the Stanford
report, statistics on demographic characteristics by amount and type of
Internet use were not reported, nor were racial/ethnic group differences. Gender and age differences were
reported. Men spent more time online
than did women and engaged in different types of activities (e.g., commerce,
games). Time online increased between
the ages of 12 and 35, and remained at or above average until the mid-50s, when
it began to decline.
Relationships between
demographic characteristics and Internet use have been of considerable interest
to both researchers and dot.com marketers.
Numerous surveys have focused on income, education, gender and race in
an effort to understand differences in the frequency and nature of Internet
activities among demographic groups (5-10).
Findings have been remarkably mixed.
For example, a recent report by comScore (5, July 17, 2001), an Internet
marketing research group, concluded that "It appears that the
less-educated use the Web to amuse themselves and their friends, while the
well-educated use the Web as part of their careers." In contrast, the Stanford study (discussed
earlier) concluded that once access is obtained, demographic characteristics
are of little importance to the amount and type of Internet use.
A recent report by the Pew
Internet & American Life Project described differences in the online
behavior of African-Americans and European Americans (6). Findings indicated that African Americans
were less likely to go online in a typical day than were European Americans
(36% versus 56%), and less likely to use e-mail (27% versus 49%). The nature of Internet activities also
differed for the two groups. African
Americans were more likely to listen to music, seek religious information, play
games, download music, seek information about jobs, seek information about a
place to live, and conduct school research and job training. They were more likely to believe that the
Internet helped them to get health care information and information about
hobbies, and less likely to believe that it helped them to connect to family
and friends. Again these results appear
to conflict with the conclusion of the Stanford researchers that demographic
characteristics do not matter once access is obtained.
Another report by the Pew
Internet & American Life Project (7) focused on gender differences in
Internet use. Findings indicated no
gender difference in e-mail use, chat, instant messages, browsing for fun,
school-related or job-related research, accessing popular culture (e.g., downloading
music), and arranging travel and banking.
However, women were more likely to seek health care information,
research new jobs, and play games online.
Men were more likely to seek news and financial information, shop,
participate in online stock trading and auctions, access government sites, and
search for sports news.
Marketing surveys frequently
find income-based differences in Internet use.
A study by Nielsen/NetRatings (8) found that low-income groups spend
more time surfing the Web at home than do more affluent groups. Similar results
were obtained in a study by Media Metrix, Inc. (9). Once again these results appear to conflict with conclusions from
Stanford study (3).
Results from the HomeNetToo
project, presented next, describe the Internet use of low-income adults using
server-logged as well as self-report measures of Internet use. Relationships between Internet use and
demographic characteristics are examined, namely race, education and
income. Ethnographic accounts of
participants' experiences with the Internet augment quantitative findings
regarding the frequency and nature of home Internet use.
Methods
Participants and Procedures
Participants were 117 adult
residents of a low-income, medium-size urban community in the mid-western
United States. In exchange for participating
in home visits, completing surveys, and allowing their Internet use to be
continuously server-logged, participants received a home computer, Internet
connection, and full technical support for the 18-month trial. Surveys were administered during home
visits at pre-trial, 1 month and 3 months, and completed online or on paper.
2
Demographic characteristics
of adult participants are presented in Table 1. Participants were primarily African American, female, never
married, working full-time, and earning less than $15,000 annually. The majority reported having some college
education or earning a college degree.
Average age of participants was 38.6 years old.
A sub-sample of adults from 30 of the 90 families
participated in 2-hour home interviews and observations at the interface. Interviews were conducted as a conversation
between interviewer and participant during which they explored the Internet
together. Interviews were recorded
unobtrusively using a small digital recorder and transcribed for content
analyses.
Table 1: Demographic characteristics of adult
participants in the HomeNetToo project (n=117)
|
Age: Mean:
38.57 years-old; Range: 19 years-old
to 75 years-old |
|
Sex: Male: 20% Female: 80% |
|
Race: African
American: 67% European American:
33% |
|
Income (annual household) |
|
Less than $10,000: 28% |
|
$10,000 - $14, 999: 21% |
|
$15,000 - $24.999: 26% |
|
$25,000 - $34.999: 17% |
|
$35,000 - $49, 999: 7% |
|
$50,000 - $75,000: 1% |
|
Greater than $75,000: 0% |
|
Education: |
|
8th grade or less: 4% |
|
Some high school but did not graduate: 10% |
|
High school graduate or Graduate Equivalency
Degree: 24% |
|
Some college:
49% |
|
College graduate of above: 13% |
|
Marital Status |
|
Never married:
42% |
|
Married, living with spouse: 25% |
|
Other (divorced, separate, widowed): 33% |
Measures
Internet use. A list of
server-logged measures of Internet use is presented in Table 2.3 For the analyses, use measures were divided
into two time periods: Time 1: 1-3
months; Time 2: 4-6 months.
Table 2: Server-logged measures of Internet use (per
day)
|
Time
on-line (minutes) |
|
# of
session (log-ins) |
|
#
of unique domain Web sites visited |
|
#
of e-mail messages sent |
|
#
of e-mail messages received |
|
#
listserv messages posted |
|
#
listserv messages received |
|
#
of newsgroup postings |
|
#
newsgroups read |
|
Total time in chats |
|
#
of chats visited |
Survey Measures. Participants
completed surveys at pre-trial and 3 months that included the following measures
considered in this report: 1) Prior Internet experience (e.g., How would
you rate the extent of your experience with the Internet? 1=no experience, 5=a
great deal of experience.); 2) Self-reported Internet use (e.g., hours online,
previous week); 3) Uses of the Internet (e.g., communicating with family); 4)
Demographic characteristics. In addition, a survey administered at 1 month
contained the self-report Internet use measures (e.g., hours online during the
previous week).
Ethnographic Measures. Content analyses of
the 2-hour home interviews were guided by an interest in identifying how these
adults made sense of the Internet as it intersected their already established
and ongoing lives.
General categories of "sense-making" were identified.
Results
The frequency and nature of Internet use based on
server-logged measures are summarized in Table 3. Omitted from the table are measures of
listserv, newsgroup and chat activities, which were essentially zero. Thus, the Internet
activities of these first-time home users focused on Web activities and, to a
lesser extent, e-mail.4
As indicated in Table 3, participants initially spent an average of 41.51
minutes/day online in a single session, visiting about 9 domains. Time online did not
change significantly from Time 1 to Time 2. Sessions became somewhat shorter, and the
number of domains visited became somewhat greater, but these differences were
not statistically significant.
E-mail activity during the first 6-months of home Internet user was
infrequent.
During both time periods, participants sent about 3 e-mails per week.
Also evident from Table 3 is the high variability in Internet use among
project participants.
For example, 25% of participants spent essentially no time online,
whereas another 25% spent over 36 minutes/day online. About half the
participants never used e-mail.
Table 3: Internet use
|
|
00 |
Time 1 | ||||
|
|
00 |
Time online (minutes) |
#
of sessions |
#
of domains visited |
#
of e-mails sent |
#
of e-mails received |
|
Mean |
00 |
41.51 |
1.00 |
9.05 |
.39 |
1.78 |
|
Std.Dev. |
00 |
87.79 |
1.47 |
13.40 |
1.07 |
3.97 |
|
%
tile |
25 |
2.45 |
.09 |
.66 |
.00 |
.12 |
|
|
50 |
12.25 |
.47 |
3.48 |
.02 |
.41 |
|
|
75 |
36.47 |
1.31 |
11.14 |
.22 |
1.22 |
|
|
00 |
Time 2 | ||||
|
Mean |
00 |
43.53 |
.74 |
10.94 |
.36 |
3.31 |
|
Std.Dev. |
00 |
96.15 |
1.03 |
17.06 |
1.36 |
8.11 |
|
%
tile |
25 |
1.21 |
.04 |
.50 |
.00 |
.14 |
|
|
50 |
12.70 |
.34 |
4.24 |
.00 |
.47 |
|
|
75 |
46.25 |
0.98 |
13.24 |
.22 |
2.14 |
Note: Values are averages/day. All measures were
automatically server-logged. Std.Dev.=standard deviation.
The correlation between self-reported time online and
server-logged measures was .49. The correlation between self-reported and
server-logged number of sessions was .71. These findings are comparable to those of the
HomeNet project (.55 and .42) and, taken together, suggest that self-report
measures of Internet use are moderately reliable.
Participants' self-reported Internet activities are presented in Table
4. Consistent
with server-logged measures, none of the activities was reported as
"frequent."
Five activities were engaged in "sometimes:" getting information about
interests/hobbies, getting information about a product, e-mailing friends,
playing games, and listening to music. Note, however, that the latter two activities
may be computer rather than Internet activities. The least frequently engaged in
activities were viewing pornography, creating a Web page and getting job
training.
Table 4:Mean level of Internet activities
|
Type of Activity |
Mean |
Std.Dev. |
|
E-mail friends |
2.83 |
1.45 |
| E-mail family |
2.58 |
1.41 |
| E-mail people at work |
1.79 |
1.24 |
| Communicate with strangers |
1.71 |
1.19 |
| Mailing List activities |
1.68 |
1.06 |
| Getting help with a personal problem |
1.75 |
1.07 |
| Getting information I need for work |
2.19 |
1.32 |
| Downloading software |
1.98 |
1.18 |
| Getting information about interest/hobbies |
3.05 |
1.22 |
| Getting information about a product |
2.84 |
1.19 |
| Getting information about continuing education |
2.49 |
1.29 |
| Getting information about job opportunities |
2.51 |
1.36 |
| Reading the local news |
2.20 |
1.21 |
| Finding out about the weather |
2.30 |
1.23 |
| Doing school/course work |
2.00 |
1.30 |
| Viewing pornographic material |
1.21 |
.68 |
| Listening to music |
2.77 |
1.47 |
| Playing games |
2.82 |
1.42 |
| Visiting chat rooms |
1.82 |
1.08 |
| Reading newsgroups |
1.81 |
1.02 |
| Buying a product |
1.81 |
.99 |
| Getting information about government/politics |
1.70 |
.93 |
| Taking a course/viewing educational material |
1.88 |
1.19 |
| Creating a web page |
1.31 |
.73 |
| Getting job training |
1.37 |
.78 |
| Filling our forms |
2.08 |
1.14 |
| Getting information about parenting |
1.71 |
1.11 |
| Getting information about health of health care |
2.26 |
1.22 |
Prior
experience
Four questions on the pre-trial survey measured experience using the
Internet prior to participation in the project. Measures were combined (averaged) for the
analysis (alpha=.94).
Mean, median and modal values for the composite measure indicated that,
as expected, participants had little or no prior experience using the Internet
(1.92, 1.75, 1).
Prior experience was related to the number of e-mails sent
during time 1 (r=.30), and to all measures of Web use during time 2 (time
online, r=.28; number of sessions, r=.22; number of domains visited, r=.26), but
not to e-mail use (r=.08). Thus, prior experience using the
Internet was a poor predictor of early home Internet use, except for e-mail, but
a modest predictor of later Web use.
Demographic characteristics
Race. Correlations
(Spearman) between race and Internet use (log transformations) were significant
for number of sessions at time 1 (r=.19), and for all Web use measures at time 2
(rs=.27, .31, .23, time online, number of sessions, number of domains visited,
respectively).
Mean levels of Internet use are presented in Table 5. One-way analyses of
variance indicated that over time, African Americans used the Web less than did
European Americans.
Thus, while there were no significant race differences initially, after 3
months of home Internet access African Americans used the Web, but not e-mail,
less than did European Americans.
Table 5: Race and Internet use
|
|
|
N |
Mean |
Std. Dev. |
F(1,103) | |||
|
Time 1 |
||||||||
| Time online (min.) |
AfAm |
78 |
42.73 |
100.89 |
1.64 |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
39.01 |
52.53 |
| |||
| # of sessions |
AfAm |
78 |
.84 |
1.25 |
3.59* |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
1.31 |
1.82 |
|
|||
| # of domains visited |
AfAm |
78 |
7.92 |
12.34 |
2.67 |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
11.36 |
15.28 |
|
|||
| # of e-mails sent |
AfAm |
78 |
.34 |
1.04 |
1.28 |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
.48 |
1.14 |
|
|||
| Time 2 | ||||||||
|
Time online |
AfAm |
79 |
42.08 |
111.19 |
6.48* |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
46.55 |
53.92 |
|
|||
| # of sessions |
AfAm |
79 |
.56 |
.91 |
9.70* |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
1.10 |
1.16 |
|
|||
| # of domains visited |
AfAm |
79 |
9.12 |
16.28 |
5.44* |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
14.73 |
18.22 |
|
|||
| # of e-mails sent |
AfAm |
79 |
.24 |
1.03 |
1.76 |
|||
| |
EuAm |
38 |
.60 |
1.85 |
|
|||
F-values are for the analyses of log transformed data. *p<.05.
Age. Age was related
(negatively) to number of sessions and domains visited at both time periods,
although only time period 2 correlations approached significance (rs=-.18, -.17,
respectively).
Mean levels of Internet use for participants under 38 years old (median
age) and those over 38 (Table 5) indicated that older participants used the
Internet less than did younger participants, especially during time 2.
Table 6: Age and Internet Use
|
|
|
N |
Mean |
Std. Dev. |
F(1,103) | ||
|
Time 1 |
|||||||
| Time online (min.) |
Under 38 |
54 |
44.61 |
71.42 |
1.00 |
||
| |
38
and over |
61 |
39.05 |
101.22 |
|
||
| # of sessions |
Under 38 |
54 |
1.27 |
1.84 |
3.02* |
||
| |
38
and over |
61 |
.76 |
1.03 |
|
||
| # of domains visited |
Under 38 |
54 |
10.97 |
14.44 |
2.59 |
||
| |
38
and over |
61 |
7.38 |
12.40 |
|
||
| # of e-mails sent |
Under 38 |
54 |
.55 |
1.20 |
1.68 |
||
| |
38
and over |
61 |
.25 |
.94 |
|
||
| Time 2 | |||||||
|
Time online |
Under 38 |
54 |
.55 |
1.20 |
1.68 |
||
| |
38
and over |
61 |
.25 |
1.00 |
|
||
| # of sessions |
Under 38 |
54 |
.88 |
1.15 |
3.86* |
||
| |
38
and over |
62 |
.62 |
.91 |
|
||
| # of domains visited |
Under 38 |
54 |
13.57 |
19.50 |
6.00* |
||
| |
38
and over |
62 |
8.63 |
14.54 |
|
||
| # of e-mails sent |
Under 38 |
54 |
.37 |
1.36 |
.08 |
||
| |
38
and over |
62 |
.35 |
1.38 |
|
||
Education. Education was
related to Internet use at time 2 only. Greater education was associated with more
time online (r=.26), and more sessions (r=.27). Mean differences (Table 7) indicated that
participants with a high school education or less spent less time online and had
fewer Internet sessions than did participants with more education.
Table 7:
Education and Internet use
|
|
|
N |
Mean |
Std.Dev. |
F(1,103) |
| |
|
Time 1 |
|||||||
| Time online (min.) |
High school graduate or less |
42 |
35.76 |
64.27 |
.24 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
48.08 |
105.29 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
33.32 |
75.54 |
|
| |
|
#
of sessions |
High school graduate or less |
42 |
1.02 |
1.60 |
.20 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
1.05 |
1.55 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
.75 |
.65 |
|
| |
|
#
of domains visited |
High school graduate or less |
42 |
10.13 |
15.24 |
.91 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
9.62 |
13.58 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
3.95 |
3.28 |
|
| |
|
#
of e-mails sent |
High school graduate or less |
42 |
.23 |
.64 |
1.41 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
.55 |
1.38 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
.21 |
.47 |
|
| |
|
Time 2 | |||||||
|
Time online |
High school graduate or less |
43 |
41.75 |
109.19 |
4.44* |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
41.54 |
87.84 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
57.66 |
95.67 |
|
| |
|
#
of sessions |
High school graduate or less |
43 |
.69 |
1.23 |
4.81* |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
.75 |
.96 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
.85 |
.64 |
|
| |
|
#
of domains visited |
High school graduate or less |
43 |
11.84 |
21.91 |
1.46 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
10.80 |
14.96 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
8.83 |
7.26 |
|
| |
|
#
of e-mails sent |
High school graduate or less |
43 |
.46 |
1.75 |
.10 |
|
|
| |
Some college |
58 |
.35 |
1.21 |
|
|
|
| |
College graduate or more |
15 |
.16 |
.24 |
|
| |
Income. Income was unrelated
to Internet use.
Ethnographic accounts of Internet use
The content of conversations with participants at the interface was
classified into 4 clusters of 10 general subject matter categories. This report focuses
on the first and predominant cluster - Using the Internet.5 Within this cluster participants
talked about: (1) how they used the Internet; (2) concerns about the Internet;
(3) frustrations with using the Internet; (4) obstacles encountered in using the
Internet.
(1) How participants used the Internet. Participants' talk
about how they used the Internet accounted for 28% of the conversational content
and, along with the three other categories in this cluster, accounted for 46% of
participants' talk.
Four sense-making categories of use were identified: interpersonal
communication, parenting support, practical information, and "other," the latter
a diverse category that included such uses as refuge and image source.
Interpersonal Communication.
Communication was a primary strategy of understanding emerging from
participants’ engagement with the Internet. Among those who used e-mail, the
Internet made sense as a communication devise, often as an alternative to the
expense of long distance phoning and the preparation necessary for letter
writing. For
some, it was meaningful for maintaining friendships:
“To me the e-mail has been the best part.”
“We were able to communicate with each other, and caught up,
and with the exception of catching each other’s tears, we were able to
communicate without a phone bill after all those years.”
“I don’t have to search the house for a phone book, I can go
straight to the computer for it. I don’t have to be running around looking for
a typewriter. I
can do it right here; it’s all right here.”
Participants also made sense of the Internet in ways that
achieved different, and sometimes new, approaches to their interpersonal
communication practices. For one participant, writing rather than
speaking interpersonally served to stimulate the creative muse, and she
good-naturedly warned:
“Anyone I have given my e-mail to, be prepared because you
will get a novel.
I can express myself better when I am writing or typing. I really like
e-mail.”
On the other hand, talking with strangers did not make sense
to too many of our participants. Some expressed a purposeful non-use of chat
rooms. As one
woman said:
“I don’t like it...I don’t talk to people I don’t know. I have people I can
talk to, so no, I don’t go to the chat room.”
In addition, the subject matter of many chat rooms was not
meaningful to participants who had either heard about or visited them:
“I would definitely shut it right off if I thought the wrong
question or anything came about. But see, why even put yourself in that
situation if you think that might happen.”
Parenting support.
Participants readily made sense of the Internet as a parenting tool and,
as such, its most significant meaning was access to resources so that homework
could be completed at home rather than having to arrange library access. Freed from these
constraints, parents felt they were able to better level the educational playing
field for their children. As one parent said:
“If it weren’t for this, that meant that I had to go in my
car, go to the library, and if you get to go to the computer...because there’s
only so many there, you know. That was one thing that was really
helpful. That
worked a lot.
That really helped.”
Parents also attributed a basic sense of social literacy to
the Internet:
“This is the future of our kids, this is what the world’s
going to; to survive our future is right here.”
Practical information.
Participants made sense of the Internet as a personalized source of
practical information to meet specific, individualized needs.
“It’s allowed us to access information we’d normally
wouldn’t have, we’d have to go out of our homes for, so that helps us; it’s
served a very good purpose.”
Two additional patterns emerged within this category. First,
African-American users talked about the widest range of practical
information-seeking via the Internet. They found it a meaningful way to bring
information into the home that might otherwise require a trip to the library,
the bus station or a newsstand. Second, low skill users were more likely to
make sense of the Internet in terms of its potential rather than actual use in
providing practical information for their lives. As one woman said:
“I can just sit here and you see how big it is, the inside;
it’s like all this is knowledge and I want this knowledge and there’s so much in
there and I just want to learn it.”
Other sense-making uses of the Internet.
Participants made sense of the Internet as a place of personal
retreat. Some
found this refuge meaningful as a way to fill time, relieve boredom, or
transition from one activity to another:
“When somebody’s on the computer whatever it is they’re
doing on that computer at that time, that’s the world they’re in ... it’s
another world.”
“I escape on the computer all the time ... I like feeling
‘connected to the world’ and I can dream.”
The most inclusive pattern, however, was the sense made of
this refuge for tension and stress relief. Typical are the words of one woman who
said:
“If I’m stressed out or depressed or the day is not going
right, I just get on the computer and just start messing around and I come up
with all sorts of things like “okay, wow!”
In addition to the Internet as refuge, African-Americans often made sense
of Internet access as an image enhancer. Just having it was meaningful:
“You get a lot of respect because you have a computer in
your house.”
“I just think it makes us look more
progressive.”
(2) Concerns about Internet. Along with
participants’ meaningful embrace of the Internet’s usefulness, there was also a
sense of some very real dangers associated with it. The dominant pattern
here suggested the betrayal of a promise and a trust. Participants were
distressed by a sense of the Internet as pernicious, and their primary focus
concerned their responsibilities as parents. Parenting concerns included talk about
the ‘bad stuff out there,’ about pornographic and sexual predators, and about
the unwanted temptation the Internet posed for their children.
Predatory.
In addition to specific concerns about pornography and about what goes on
in chat rooms, participants had a general sense of the Internet as a place “out
there” that was full of bad stuff:
“At first I thought it was like a danger zone, when they
talk about the Internet. I thought it was a way of looking for
trouble. Like
steal your kid or some weirdo could come and kidnap you and kill you.”
“I just tell them there are some things in the computers
that are bad, that you have to be careful with...you can find a lot of things on
the computer, things you wouldn’t think you could see, in the computer you can
find it.”
Participants were particularly outraged with their sense
that predatory pornographers inhabited the Internet. As one father
reported:
“The very first time we got this my daughter got on it and
she went to White House dot com thinking she was going to the White House, but
that’s White House dot gov, but we didn’t know this and it was a porno
site. And I
thought this was really outrageous, that they put it so close, knowing that
children go there so much...I was pretty ticked off about it. I think that was
intentional on the people who made the site. They’re dirty people....I thought it was
pretty pathetic that they would do something like that...that was low.”
Participants also understood the chat room as a
predatory space, both for themselves and their children.
“This word right here scares me...’chat’...because I like to
know who I’m communicating with. But at the same time they can never find out
who I am, but still... Just watching the TV, things that have happened...bad
things. I don’t
see good things happen to them. I just rather for me and my family not to
chat. Especially my girls.”
“I have talked to them about chat lines and stuff, and you
shouldn’t get on to nothing like that because you don’t know who you’re talking
to. Whether
they sound friendly or not, you don’t even know who you’re talking
to.”
Even chatrooms that might have seemed safe were found to
betray:
“This is kind of confusing because when you go to the
Christian chat rooms they’re doing the same thing as the regular chat rooms.
Language-wise and trying to find a mate-wise, its kind of the same. And you hear a lot
of different things on it.”
Participants also had a sense that the Internet created
issues of parent-child trust. While they recognized a need to set guidelines
and monitor their children's Internet use, they also recognized the need to
trust their children:
“Any time they’re on the computer, I worry that
they’re seeing something they’re not supposed to, but she’ll tell me ‘mama,
don’t worry.’"
“You have to have some trust in your children,
but then again you have to be a parent and realize that children are going to
make mistakes, and they’re going to do things, and they are easily
influenced.”
Parents sought various means of finding some sense that, as
one parent said, “I can control this.” As one parent reported:
“I know how to go into the computer and look up what’s been
looked up on the web site for the last three weeks...l know how to go to the
history and pull up a page...I just, for my personal, I want to know what
they’re looking at. I like to monitor.”
Others attempted to harness the technology to assist them,
but were uniformly dissatisfied with the results. One user's words were
common knowledge:
“We can control pornography on here, but then it limits what
we can do.”
“If I block them, they can’t do their homework. I found that
out. They can’t
get into what they really need to get into.”
Perilous.
Some users, but particularly low-skill users, sensed a danger of
addiction and isolation about the Internet. One person called it “hypnotic.” Others
commented that:
“The more you deal with the computer it seems like it clings
to you and you want to get deeper into it, so actually I run from it because I
could get stuck to it.”
“I heard of people having mental problems” [when they] “get
on and don’t know how to get off or cook dinner or go to work.”
Participants also had a sense of the Internet as a risky place to reveal
personal and private information, such as credit card, address and telephone
information.
Some questioned the validity of information available on the
Internet:
“The scary thing about the computer is anybody can put
anything on the computer, and there is something in the written word. Hopefully my kids
won’t suffer from this, but there’s something about putting things in writing
that makes it believable to people.”
(3) Frustrations with the Internet. While participants
envisioned a place for the Internet in the practices of their everyday lives,
its actual as well as potential usefulness was frequently accompanied by a sense
of its deficiency.
Faulty performance.
Unlike their experiences with other communication resources that are
seamlessly integrated into daily life, there was a sense of obtrusiveness about
using the Internet.
While television, radio and telephone respond instantaneously to your
commands, the Internet makes you wait:
“I used to call my kids to ask them what’s wrong, and
they’re ‘like Mom, you still have the hour glass there.”
Some participants developed schemes for dealing with this
performance deficiency:
“It takes a while to move from site to site...and sometimes
when I am waiting I’ll get up and grab something to eat and drink...and I’ll
still be waiting.”
“Sometimes it freezes up and I can be in the middle of
looking for something or playing a game or something or reading and I’ll be ‘Oh,
no, not now!’ But I’ll just have to wait until it passes, so I wait and then try
again and sometimes right again.”
"I’ve learned to adapt, I’ll sit back...I give myself more
extra time.”
Others simply vent their frustrations:
“How frustrated I get when I go on the Internet
and I get mad and I shut it off and about fifteen minutes I’ll come back and get
on again and get mad and shut it off...pouncing and stomping up the stairs”
Inadequate guidance.
Participants recognized that there was a learning curve associated with
using the Internet.
As participants said:
“That gets frustrating because I don’t know everything about
the computer yet.”
“Like I said, my technology words aren’t
clear.”
Nevertheless, they expected that the computer itself would
be more helpful in guiding them through its process. They had a sense of it as a
partner that should know and be responsive to their needs, and understand their
intentions. And
they were disappointed:
“Computers are supposed to be pretty smart, they say. I feel like it’s
supposed to be showing me things that make sense. I don’t know if it’s just not loading, or the
computer don’t figure out what I put down.”
“I don’t know what the word is because I don’t know the
computer verbiage...I get frustrated...just give me the information!”
Duplicitous.
Many participants had a sense that the Internet delivered less than was
claimed or implied.
Users found the commercialization of the Internet in conflict with its
implied promise as a great information resource. For some it was the disappointment of
discovering that access to content might require payment; for others it was a
more general annoyance with the intrusion of advertisements.
“I was bummed out when I saw it. When it popped up I
was excited but when I clicked on it and saw I had to pay $30. I was let down.”
“I wish they didn’t have these things here...I don’t want to
go...I know some people would like to, and look at a 2 percent credit card, but
I’m not so.”
(4) Obstacles to Internet use. Participants,
regardless of skill level, had a sense of the Internet as alien and
enigmatic. Its
logic did not make sense and it worked with a foreign language. Using the Internet
generated apprehensive about what one might do to “mess-up” the technology. For African-American
users there was an additional sense of intimidation because the Internet raised
the specter of being perceived as “dumb.” For the most part, these obstacles were
attributed to the limitations of the user rather than to the performance the
Internet, and they were more characteristic of low skill than high skill
users.
Alien logic.
The logic of the Internet was not intuitive. Far from it:
“It just seems so, I don’t know, convoluted or
something.”
“I know how to find what I need usually, but in
this medium ... I don’t really. It’s less familiar, it's not comfortable.”
“But I don’t think I really understand the Internet. I feel there’s some
sort of secret behind using it.”
The language system of the Internet seemed foreign to
users. They had
a sense that it consisted of jargon and codes that baffled the imagination and
didn’t seem to be defined anywhere. Faced with this discontinuity, users said:
“I feel like I somehow don’t have the right words, or that
it’s just too narrow”
“I always have to find out the way to abbreviate some of the
ways you get in, like I needed to go back to school to get the correct
stuff.”
But school was not uniformly the answer to decoding the
Internet. As
one user lamented:
“I never cried here...but in that class, it was like
Chinese, and this was supposed to be an introduction...and I didn’t know how to
click... ‘On an icon?’ An icon is something in church... Mary and Jesus is what
I saw growing up.”
High maintenance learning.
Participants who lacked computer experience were adrift in their early
attempts to use the Internet. One woman's comments capture this sense:
"We couldn’t wait. I left my son and I had to pick him up in a
few minutes, and I was like nothing is going to stop me from getting here when
she brings this computer. I was just so excited. I mean then when we
got it, and after, we were like ‘what do we do?’"
Other participants reiterated this sense of wanting to use
the Internet, but not having the hands-on kind of instruction they needed to
bridge that gap:
“You know regular people like me, who want a computer, what
would they do without support?”
“I mean I’m trying to learn, but I don’t know how.”
At the same time participants also recognized that learning
how to use the Internet was time consuming. It required practice, and that meant finding
and devoting time to using it. One person’s story is typical:
"A lot of times I’m real busy, and it was hard for me to get
a turn on the computer too. My best chance of getting time on the computer
is I get up at 6 am and the rest of the family gets up at seven. So if I finish my
bath and get ready quickly I can get on before anyone else is up. And I can have an
hour space to do whatever I want while they’re sleeping and getting up and
dressed themselves."
For others there just did not seem to be time anywhere in
the ongoing requirements of their day. As one woman characterized this sense of the
discontinuity between her situation and using the Internet:
“I feel like I don’t have time ...who has time to watch or
play with these machines. There’s so much more in life to do.”
Discussion
Early results of the HomeNetToo project indicate that during the first
six months of home Internet access low-income adults spent about 42 minutes/day
online, in 1 session, and visiting 10 domains. Although half the participants did not use
e-mail at all, others were thoroughly engaged in this activity. However, the main
Internet activity was finding personally relevant information on the Web. Mailing list,
newsgroup and chat activities were virtually nonexistent. Self-report measures
of Internet use were reliably related to server-logged measures.
Prior experience using the Internet was related to home Internet use
(1-3). However,
much stronger relationships were observed between use and demographic
characteristics. African Americans used the Internet less than
did European Americans, especially after the novelty of home Internet access
dissipated (6).
Participants under the age of 38 used the Internet more than did older
participants, and this difference also increased with time (1-10). Participants with
only a high school education or less used the Internet less than did more
educated participants (cf., 8). This relationship also grew stronger with
time.
We found no relationships between gender and Internet use, consistent
with recent findings (6). Nor was income related to use, contrary to
previous findings (e.g., 1, 6). The homogeneity of our sample with respect to
income may account for these null findings. Almost half the participants in the HomeNetToo
project earned less than $15,000/year.
Ethnographic accounts of participants' experiences with the Internet
provided rich accounts that complement quantitative findings. Participants
incorporated the Internet into their ongoing lives as a communication device
that had advantages over existing technologies. As one participant expressed it, "with the
exception of catching each other’s tears, we were able to communicate without a
phone bill after all those years.” Chat rooms, on the other hand, were seldom
incorporated.
Many participants were wary of chat rooms before the project began, and
avoided them altogether. Others had direct experiences that confirmed
prior negative expectations. But the most fundamental reason for low chat
activity was that participants felt little need for it: “I don’t talk to
people I don’t know.
I have people I can talk to, so no, I don’t go to the chat room.”
All participants made sense of the Internet as an information
resource. It
supported parenting:
“This is the future of our kids, this is what the world’s going to; to
survive our future is right here.” It provided convenient access to information:
“It’s allowed us to access information we’d normally wouldn’t have, we’d have to
go out of our homes for, so that helps us; it’s served a very good
purpose.” It
permitted a welcome escape: “I escape on the computer all the time...I
like feeling ‘connected to the world’ and I can dream.” It conferred
status: “You
get a lot of respect because you have a computer in your house.”
But the story of Internet use in the home is not all good news. For many
participants the Internet had a dark side. There was a sense that the Internet was
predatory and perilous - that there was "bad stuff out there." The main concern was
for the welfare of children: “At first I thought it was like a danger zone,
when they talk about the Internet….Like steal your kid or some weirdo could come
and kidnap you and kill you.” “I didn’t know it [pornography] was that easy
to access.”
Concerns about potential dangers for children raised issues of
parent-child trust:
“You have to have some trust in your children, but then again you have to
be a parent and realize that children are going to make mistakes, and they’re
going to do things, and they are easily influenced.”
Participants developed a variety of strategies for coping with their
concerns about the Internet. Some routinely monitored the children's
Internet use.
Others attempted, unsuccessfully, to enlist the technology itself (i.e.,
filtering software).
But a sense of the Internet as a dangerous place lingered for some. Still others were
concerned about its addictive properties: “The more you deal with the computer it seems
like it clings to you and you want to get deeper into it, so actually I run from
it because I could get stuck to it.”
The plodding pace and unreliable delivery of the Internet frustrated
participants, as did its failure to provide the kind of assistance that users
expected of it:
"Computers are supposed to be pretty smart, they say. I feel like it’s
supposed to be showing me things that make sense." The commercialism of
the Internet violated expectations about its value as an information resource:
“I wish they didn’t have these things here...I don’t want to go...I know some
people would like to, and look at a 2 percent credit card, but I’m not so.”
Another frustration that participants struggled to articulate was the
alien logic of the Internet: “it just seems so, I don’t know, convoluted or
something.”
"It’s less familiar, its not comfortable.” “I feel there’s some sort of secret behind
using it.”
While participants appreciated the need for training, training itself
heightened anxiety for some, who found themselves still unable to unlock the
secrets of computer logic: “I never cried here...but in that class, it was like
Chinese, and this was supposed to be an introduction." And with the
recognition the time would need to be invested to learn how to use the Internet,
some concluded:
"I feel like I don’t have time ...who has time to watch or play with
these machines.
There’s so much more in life to do.”
These early findings of the HomeNetToo project have implications for
technology development if universal use, and not just universal access to the
Internet is a desired goal. First, new tools are needed to guide the user
through the "logic" of the Internet, tools that go beyond more efficient search
routines to understand the "mind" of the user - his questions, intentions, and
goals. In other words, these new tools should think like the user. Second, new
tools are needed so that parents can better control the content of the Internet
that comes into their homes. Participants' accounts of their experiences
with currently available filtering methods make clear that none is up to the
task. Existing
products block desirable and undesirable content alike, and render the Internet
more frustrating to use - slower, less reliable, more confusing, than it already
is for new users, and for some old ones as well.
At a more general level, the HomeNetToo findings highlight the need for
more user-oriented design, not just in Internet applications but in information
technology (IT) in general. Both hardware and software design have thus
far been driven by a limited set of users, namely well-educated professionals in
IT or related fields.
As the Internet and IT extend their reach to the sub-Sahara, remote rural
villages in China, and to every point on the globe the need to adapt design to
user characteristics become all the more urgent. Now is a propitious time to begin an
assessment of what user characteristics are important, and how IT can best be
designed to accommodate them.
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Footnotes
1 This
research was supported by a National Science Foundation/Information Technology
Research Grant,
#0085348, titled "HomeNetToo: Motivational, affective and cognitive
factors and Internet use: Explaining the digital divide and the Internet
paradox."
September 1, 2000 to September 30, 2003. Linda A. Jackson, Principal Investigator.
2 The
HomeNetToo project is in progress. Data collection (server logging and surveys)
will be completed in May 2002. User interfaces are being designed and tested
to evaluate the benefits of adapting interface design to the user cognitive
style.
Approximately 140 children of the adults discussed in this report are
also participating in the project. Among other measures, school and standardized
test performance of these children will be related to their home Internet
use.
3 Additional measures of Internet use not considered in this
report were also server-logged.
4 Because
distributions of server-logged Internet use were highly skewed, log
transformations of the data were used in the analyses.
5 The other clusters were "friendliness of the Internet
(familiarity, design preferences), integration of the Internet (location in the
home, effect on family), and engagement with the Internet (processes of
interaction, creative activity).