Gender

How does gender affect the digital divide?

There are many factors that cause women to fall behind in technology in comparison to men, these are often cultural, economic or educational reasons that impair women's abilities to access a full realm of technological advances. However the extent of the digital divide due to gender relies partly on cultural difference, economic situation and poverty of a country; showing that all my selected topics interlink with eachother showing how all aspects can affect eachother.

In Developing Countries

Infrastructure

In most developing countries the infrastructure in rural and poorer areas is significantly weaker than in urban cities. In Africa, Internet connectivity is often only available in large cities, in which women are least likely to live. Women are therefore a lot more unlikely to have the access to technology that is more widely available to men in developing countries; however limited this may be. In rural towns that women are likely to live in, there is less than a 0.1% chance in some areas of Africa that an Internet connection can be established and the nearest town may be several days walk away, making access to the Internet virtually impossible. Poor mobile phone coverage also may make it improbable for a mobile phone connection to be achieved in rural areas; therefore mobile phones are mostly only used for business purposes. As women are not culturally able to work either at all, or in the fields of work that may require mobile communication, it is unlikely they will require the use of a phone. 

• Improve Internet and mobile connections so that more mobiles and computers can be used in rural areas.
• Build better communication towers to ensure connections can be established
• Make computer and phone centres more accessible to the public by setting up more in busy rural areas so that everybody has the chance to access technology no matter where they live

Education and Skills


Education and skills are two extremely important factors that affect the digital divide; in developed countries education is received equally between genders however in developing countries much less emphasis is placed on women in regards to education and learning. In 2007 Unicef estimated that 100 million school age children in Africa were not in education; 67% of these children were female and two thirds of the world's 900 million illiterate adults are women. Africa is a continent that sees poverty as a normality; some families cannot afford to send all or any of their children to school; often the males are first priority and girls are often sent to the market place or farm to work and earn money that would be more useful to a family than getting an education. It is because of this lack of education that makes women less likely to understand the technology behind computers and phones and be able to utilize them in the correct manner; women that are unable to read will not be able to use digital items effectively. 

• Ensure that women get the same education as men up to secondary level, until learning is no longer mandatory. This will ensure that as long as an individual wishes to continue in education they receive the same level of teaching
• Set up basic reading and writing classes at the weekend so that even girls who don't attend school regularly can be taught to read and write adequately
•  A fund should be set up to pay girls for attending school so they aren't required to work to get money

Language barriers


Linking in with women's lack of education in developing countries is the inability to understand different languages that may be used on the Internet and mobile phones. Charities that send on used mobile phones to developing countries are often programmed to English, as the majority of these charities originate in the USA or UK, and women who have not received an adequate secondary education will not have the skills to understand English and make sense of the vocabulary used. Given this limited language barrier women are much less likely than men to not use technology due to the foreign languages that are often used online or digitally. 

• Encourage the teaching of English in schools in developing countries so that children get a basic grasp of the English language
• Set up weekend classes so that girls who aren't able to attend school regularly still get the chance to learn English
• Create basic web pages in languages spoken in developing countries so that they are relevant to those learning it; even if they can't view the whole web they can get a basic understanding of how the Internet works

Social/Cultural restraints


In many developing countries women are viewed as inferior to men; they are the child bearers who raise the family whereas the men go out to work to earn money to provide for his family. Religion may also come into the picture as in some religions women are expected to be obedient to their husbands and if he does not wish for his wife to use technology or learn how to, then she will be unable to do what she wishes. Also, as places where technology may be found are often situated far away from rural areas, women may be unable to use any form of public transports to get there. This may be due to lack of funds to provide transport costs or how in some cultures women are not able to access public methods of transport and must find their owns means to getting themselves around. However transport may not be an issue in some cases, as in more severe conditions women are not expected to leave the house other than to collect water or food, as they should be tending to the house and the family while her husband is away at work. 
Places in which computers are found may also be in places that women are not socially recommended to visit or may be in environments that make a woman awkward; it is difficult to learn how to use computers in an environment where you may not be expected to be able to cope with the knowledge it takes to operate such devices. 

• Set up women-only Internet and phone cafes to encourage women to attend without feeling socially awkward
• Set up a free shuttle bus to transport women to the nearest local internet centre to give her the means to access the Internet
• Charge lower prices to women so they are the ones that are encouraged to use the computers or phones rather than the men

Media Limitations


The media often portrays technology as a masculine purchase which may deter some women from wanting to use or learn how to use the products it is advertising. Also, in developing countries, a lot of purposes that a computer is used for (such as stocks and social networking) would not appeal to a female market that have no such use for a computer. Also the Internet content that is available in developing countries is often of little relevance to women and doesn't not encourage a woman to learn how to use a computer as she has no interest as to what is offered online.

• Advertise sites that are appealing to women in developing, such as those that could be helpful in cooking or child bearing, and potentially improve their quality of life
• Send leaflets in the local language to tell women of sites that are online that may be useful to them
• Promote female related devices to encourage women to try and use computers/phones.

In the UK
Locally the divide between the genders is not as severe as that seen in developing countries around the world; however we do see a slight difference in the activites carried out on technology dependant on gender. In the UK it is estimated that the ratio of Young people in Britain using a computer regularly is 53:47 percent boy to girl ratio. However in teenagers and children girls use computers slightly more than boys however this may be due to the emphasis teenage boys are now placing on computer games and consoles. And teenage girls are also more likely to use their mobile phone and place greater emphasis on the importance of the newest models of devices and are twice as likely to choose their phone over a computer or a games console. Women in the work place are also 35% more likely to send emails and check their email accounts on a more regular basis than men showing that they are more frequent users of online communication services. Women tend to use and send more personal emails than men and are more likely to recieve emails from friends and family rather than work-related.

However though women may use some features of the web more frequently than men, there are also several areas where males dominate the web. Research suggests that the reasons why many older women in the UK do not spend as much time online as men due to their household responsibilities of cleaning and looking after the children which may shape their ability to access the computer; especially women who work, as they will have to juggle work and home life and would leave little time spare for surfing the web. There is also a lot of sexism apparent on the net; women may feel uncomfortable revealing their gender as they could feel threatened or intimidated by the abuse they may suffer in chat rooms or in forums due to their gender. Also, men search for information on the web on average 125 days each year in contrast to women who only search on average 88 days in the year; this information proves that men are more likely to use the internet as a means of information than women.

The Current Situation

The effects of gender on the digital divide vary from country to country; my research has shown me that the majority of countries that show a large divide between the genders are usually third world or are nations that put large emphasis on religion in which women are seen as inferior. In these types of conditions women would be restricted by social, religious and economic problems that may not allow them to have equality in terms of access to computers and mobile phones. These restrictions to technology can be harmful in women's education and skills in later life as the world is becoming predominately run by electronic based systems and the Internet is becoming the world's most in depth source of information; those who do not have the oppurtunity to research via the Internet and learn basic computer skills will statistically have lower wages and worse jobs in later life. Women in many developing countries are being denied the right to information just because of their gender which is harbouring their journey to success; in these countries women are seen as inferior and get worse education and are lower in the heriarchy of society. If these nations allowed women to achieve an equal status as men and allowed them the same oppurtunities then we would see the digital divide lessen significantly as females all over the world would get to use a computer for quite possibly the first time.

In the UK the divide between the genders is not as stark as in less developed countries; here women and men are seen as equal in society and throughout all stages of life both sexes are offered the same oppurtunites both in education and work related systems. This equality has ensured that the digital divide is dependant on an individual's personal interests and choices of what they wish to achieve with technology; as we are all able to achieve access to technology either through home, school, work or public domains such as libraries which provide free access to computers and the internet to those who do not own their own device.

Other Measures being taken:

• mWomen- This scheme, developed by Cherie Blair (wife of former Prime Minister) and US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, is designed to allow women in developing countries to have greater access to Mobile Phones.
• CodeED- a charity which personally pays for colourful notepads to provide to lower income girls in schools in New York to encourage them to create their own websites and use programmes such as Java.
• Iridescent- A organisation that created a mobile app to get girls to take part in a competition to create a business plan.