Digital Illiteracy among Smartphone Puerto Rican Middle Class Users

María de Mater O’NeillArthur L. Asseo

2013 SME Digital Forum, San Juan, Puerto Rico

May 16, 2013

Mobile Telephony in the Developing World,University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland,

May 24 - 25, 2013

LASA 2013 – XXXI INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS,Towards a New Social Contract?

Washington, D.C., United States,May 29 – June 1, 2013

Session: Aspects of Poverty and Income Distribution

Digital Illiteracy among Puerto Rican Middle Class Smartphone Users

Apparent digital illiteracy among our design firm’s clients and their users that could not be explained by the digital divide concept.

THE TRIGGER

(Martinez, 2011, Pineda, 2012)

million mobile phones

Population of million

PUERTO RICO

(United States Census Bureau of 2010)

(Estudios Técnicos de Puerto Rico and Brand Science, cite in Grafa, 2012, Asociación de Ejecutivos de Ventas y Mercadeo de Puerto Rico 2013)

3.13.7

2.7 from

78% Smartphones(Asociación de Ejecutivos de Ventas y Mercadeo de Puerto Rico, 2013)

Puerto Ricans paid for long distance, text messaging and phone insurance.

Accessed the Internet via mobile broadband

Accessed the Web by their mobile phone

Connect to the Internet by their mobile phone daily

(Connect Puerto Rico, 2012)

(Asociación de Ejecutivos de Ventas y Mercadeo de Puerto Rico, 2012, 2013)

(Connect Puerto Rico, 2012)40%

57%

28%

70%from

LATIN AMERICA

(Zokem and the Groupe Speciale Mobile Association, 2011)

(Estadísticas del uso de los móviles en América Latina, 2010)

Smartphone use is for Mobile Web browsing

Of the new phones will be Smartphones [by 2014]

37%

32%

Of Web searches were initiated from a Smartphone

Connect to the Internet by their mobile phone every day

UNITED STATES

(Think with Google, 2012)

(Connect Puerto Rico, 2012)

65%

55%

Exclusion and inclusion in the realm of technology by:

Gender

Economy

And other social factors

DIGITAL DIVIDE

New questions: How do we define the problem?

LEVELS OF THE DIGITAL DIVIDE

Access to technology:affordability, accessibility and availability

Use and appropriation:depth and quality of use of new technologies

(Pineda, 2012)

OTHER FEATURES OF THE DIGITAL DIVIDE

Country’s Infrastructure

Cost of Service

Comprehension of Technology

(Martinez, 2011)

PUERTO RICO

Of households do not have a computer

Of households' speed connectivity is lower than the US national standard

Of rural population have no broadband or do not know where it is available

(Communications Workers of America and Connect Puerto Rico cited in Ruiz Morales, 2011)

50%38%90%

ON DIGITAL LITERACY & EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONSWE CONNECT DIGITAL LITERACY TO EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONS

New questions: What is the role of comprehension in a meaning-making practice?

How the user:Comprehends [content]Organizes [content]Executes [content]Generates [content]Accesses [content]

How the user carries out Executive Functions in the digital realm by digital artifacts that allow sharing, networking and interaction in co-location communities.

WE CONNECT DIGITAL LITERACY TO EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONS

Literacy is understood in situated contexts, in how users process and negotiate meanings.

How comprehension of technology depends on how designers and the mobile market have standardized mobile interfaces.

Always changing because of the constant negotiation and influence between user and context

All literacies (multiliteracies, business literacy, social networking literacy, software literacy)

interact with each other

(Leu, Kinzer, Coiro, & Cammack, 2004)


LITERACY AND TECHNOLOGYNew Literacies Perspective: framework of social principles related to educational issues

New questions: How do we learn to be digital?

Speed counts for connectivity and intelligibility

Learning collectively

Understanding of different modes of communication (visual, acoustic &

spatial)

Ability to understand encoded messages


LITERACY AND TECHNOLOGYNew Literacies Perspective: framework of social principles related to educational issues

OUR DEFINITION OF DIGITAL LITERACY:

A. The ability to “read” the design elements (i.e., interface) in order to do a given task

B. The comprehension of actions done through digital communication technology (consequences and responsibilities of

a digital citizen)

Digital literacy in this inquiry is the metalanguage of multiliteracies, which is having the skills of a meaning-making practice that can be critically transferred to other social domains through digital communication technology.

We are analysing the digital

language. This is the way

a user has the capacity

to understand different

literacies like business,

software, social networking

and their possible

interactions between them in

order to generate

critical content.

In other words

(AN)OTHER PERSPECTIVECultural Aspect: The case of Iran and India

Usability problems are not necessarily caused by digital illiteracy but due to cultural differences that translate into different activities in the use of mobile devices.

New questions: ...and in other places?

social networking tool

Iran (most used):

Calls Text messaging

Puerto RicoCalls Text messaging

India Multiple mobile phones

gender based system

CULTURAL USE

The design of the mobile devices that rule the global market are made from a central viewpoint and do not consider the perspective of peripheral nations.

WE CONNECT DIGITAL LITERACY TO CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

OUR RESEARCH

Limited inquiry:49 participants

July, 2012 - January, 2013

Online questionnaire

METHODOLOGY

Semi structured interviews to local UX designers

Scenario (storytelling) test

Are educated middle-class users, because of undefined factors, on the road to social exclusion because of their lack of digital interaction comprehension?

OUR TWO MAIN QUESTIONS

If such is true, what does this imply in the social contract?

Lack of digital literacy can become a problem because:

The relationship between citizen rights and digital literacy.

The impact it might have with 21st century skills (e.g., co-location team working, rapid information access and content generation).

The importance of this matter to the User Experience (UX) designers and his/her awareness of this possible occurrence, especially if they are value-driven and concerned with issues of democracy.

Online Questionnaire Survey

SMS text messaging

Email, making calls & browsing the Web

Taking Photos

Social Networks

Skype

100%96%92%75%25%


Use all the mobile applications

Are aware of the applications on the device

Asked for assistance in the use of their Smartphone (indicator of Functional Digital Illiteracy)

8%

58%

54%


CONCLUSION No connection between education level, gender, age and Functional Digital Literacy levels. Neither the operating system, data plans or types of network connection seem to affect the users’ level of understanding of the design elements in a given task.

Semi structured Interviews to 3 Local UX Designers

FreelanceIn-house UXD for BankStartup Tech Company

The criteria - designers that applied user-centered methods


FINDINGS They use limited qualitative, user experience studies (limited budget) and no contextual research methodologies.

They are missing important information concerning user behavior and experience.


Are there gaps between local UX designers and the users of mobile communication devices that might prompt more interference in the users’ digital literacy? If so, what are the particular factors (if any) that occur in the social-political landscape because of this interference?

New question: UX designers’ role?


Lesson learned: The importance of a cross-cultural approach that consists in making the necessary design adjustments to technology so that products have the ability to work in different cultures and economic levels.


To highlight the participant’s digital literacy, their beliefs, perceptions and motivations regarding the role of technological communication throught a fictitious conflict, its resolution and privacy in work related to interpersonal relationships.

Scenario (storytelling) test: Essential Components for Critical Transferring

The three benchmarks were:

Functional Digital Literacy- Did the participant understand all the technological actions that took place in the scenario? Can he or she offer solutions that may lead to different outcomes?

(Poore, 2010)

(Poore, 2010)

(Meyrowitz, 1985)

Network Digital Literacy- Issues concerning replicability, collapsed distinct social context and invisible audiences. Questions to participants were: Did the participant recognize Meyrowitz’ issues? Did the participant narrate similar stories? Did the participant recognize how his or her behavior in network communities can expose his or her beliefs, values and ethical positions?


Critical Digital Literacy- Did the participant understand the different levels of meaning-making when there is a lack of spatial content and how online behavior is perceived in asynchronous communication?


(Poore, 2010)

FINDINGS Understood all the technological actions.

Aware of the lack of spatial content.

Disapprove the supervisor firing through digital communication.

Concerned with how the supervisor dealt with the conflict


45%

77%95%

73%


All participants were suspicious about digital communication.

The only strategy would be not to use digital communication and content oriented systems.

They were not surprised of the employee’s outcome- “she should have known better”.

Scenario (storytelling) test: High Context and Face-Negotiation Theory

High Context- A society that has a collective mindset and non verbal communication between members of a group that share the same inexplicit rules of engagements..

All the participants ‘Face Negotiation’ strategies were not of digital engagement.

(Hall, 1976)

(Ting-Toomey, 1998)

RESEARCH CONCLUSIONS: Lack of trust might be strengthened by cultural dissonance on interface & HCI design

The participants might be on the road to social exclusion due to - Functional Digital Illiteracy.

CAUSED BY:The participants resist to acquire new knowledge concerning no leisure activities because of: Lack of trust and cultural habits and values.

Local designers are not taking into consideration cultural habits & digital gaps concerning technology.

The lack of contextual research - local industry or Government only uses quantitative research, they might be wrongly led to believe that access is = to comprehension.

POSIBLE REASON OF THIS BEHAVIOR

Cultural habits and values can make some aspects of digital literacy optional (not being perceived as required skills to be part of the community).

UX & HCI Design can be dissonant to local users’ cultural habits, beliefs and motivations.

POSIBLE EFFECT OF THIS BEHAVIOR

The participants’ behavior can compromise their multiliteracy skills needed to navigate critically to other social domains through digital communication technology, both as workers and citizens.

Therefore, they might be more vulnerable to coercion and manipulation by unethical business and dubious political ventures. This in turn, makes them more distrustful of technology.

Cross and inter-cultural design and its impact on digital literacy.

OUR RECOMMENDATIONS: For Further Contextual Research in the Caribbean

OUR RECOMMENDATIONSFurther Contextual Research

UX designers’ role in digital literacy (their beliefs, motivations, cultural habits and how it interferes in their methodologies).

OUR RECOMMENDATIONSFurther Contextual Research

Correlations between digital literacy and social inclusion as of way to strengthen the social contract in post-capitalism (Drucker, 1993) societies.

BALANCE & NEGOTIATION

We have found in our practice that there is a need for a balance between international standards and inter/cross cultural approaches. To be competitive in today’s global market, not incorporating successfully the Mobile Web Best Practices can be detrimental to an App’s success. Successfully negotiating glocally can be a challenge by itself.

New questions: Competitive Glocally?

New questions:

The role of value driven designers is very important when establishing the scaffolding of a network society that may strengthen liberties and rights. The responsibility of digital literacy education that takes into account cultural behaviors is not exclusively the designer’s, but one to be shared with clients, users and all members of the community.

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR DIGITAL LITERACY?

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Digital Illiteracy among Smartphone Puerto Rican Middle Class Users

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