Ep. 5 - Panel 1B - Part 1 - The lived experience of social interaction - Jessica Douglas (WIT)

NPPSH Conference

The digital divide has been discussed as a limiting factor in social cohesion, since the early 2000s (Korupp & Szydlik, 2005). Authors suggested that the digital divide was a new form of social inequality, and therefore the term digital exclusion would better reflect the unequal access to digital resources among low socio-economic and ethnic minority groups (Cushman & Klecun, 2006). With the emergence of the smartphone as a relatively cheap and ubiquitous gateway to the digital world, access has somewhat widened for many people. However, a recent study (2018) by OFCOM in the UK reveals that there still is a distinct digital divide: non-users of the internet are more likely to be aged over 65 than users. Knowles & Hanson (2018) propose that despite being more proficient than previous generations, some older people may be rejecting digital technology in protest of an increasingly digital society that they do not trust. Whether rejection, digital exclusion or a myriad of factors, low participation in digital technology may be contributing to social isolation and exclusion among this age group in Ireland, especially in rural areas. Ethnographic methods have the potential to reveal how older people interact with digital technology, and socially, in their everyday lives and thus illuminate any issues of social isolation and exclusion. This paper explores digital exclusion as a social process and discusses preliminary findings from my research into the social lives of older people in the rural South East of Ireland, and their daily use of technology. Jessica Douglas is a first year PhD student at Waterford Institute of Technology and part of the Research Group of Design and Social Innovation (DASI). Her research is an interdisciplinary study of the social lives of older people in rural South East Ireland and their interaction with technology. She is also Assistant Digital Editor of the Irish Journal of Anthropology. She gained her MA Public Cultures & Society, First Class Honours, from IADT in 2016 and she previously graduated from the University of Liverpool and The University of Sheffield with a BSc and MSc.