Digital Divide in Computer Access and Use between Poor and Non-Poor Youth

The main objectives of this study were to examine the "digital divide" in home computer ownership and to evaluate differences in academic and non-academic computer use between poor and non-poor youth. Data from a national sample of 1,029, 10- through 14-year-old young adolescents were analyzed. Results show that poor youth were.36 times as likely to own a home computer, but equally as likely to use their home computer for academic purposes as were non-poor youth. Poor youth did not differ from non-poor youth in how often they used any computer for academic purposes, but were less likely to use any computer for non-academic purposes. Government initiatives to close the digital divide and foster computer use among poor youth are suggested. Key words: digital divide; poverty; computer use; information tech-nology The phrase "digital divide"-the disparity between individ-uals who have and do not have access to information technology (IT)-became part of our country's vocabulary in the mid-1990s (Wilhelm, Carmen, & Reynolds, 2002). Well-documented inequal-ities in access to and use of IT such as the computer and Internet reflect existing patterns of social stratification in the United States (Steyaert, 2002). For example, high-income, Caucasian, married, and well-educated individuals have more access to IT compared to low-income, African American and Latino, unmarried, and less-educated individuals (National Telecommunications and In