Determinants of broadband access and affordability: An analysis of a community survey on the digital divide

Abstract

Broadband access in the home is a necessity, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic. Increasingly, connectivity is of vital importance for school, work, family, and friends. Existing international research on the implementation of broadband has studied its adoption patterns with a focus on the rural/urban digital divide. This paper explores the digital divide in a case study of the seventh largest city, by population, in the United States; San Antonio is a majority-minority city where over half of the people are Hispanic. This paper focuses on the five key affordability factors that drive broadband adoption. Researchers test social exclusion theory, the structural facets of poverty and social marginality to ascertain its potential impact on broadband access. The authors conducted a survey in both English and Spanish to learn more about the affordability factors that influence the broadband digital divide. Through our analysis, we found evidence that four of the factors (geographical disparities, profit-based discrimination, technology deployment cost, and socio-economic factors) played a role in the digital divide in this case study. The results of this study demonstrate that the digital divide is not exclusively a rural/urban digital divide, but can also occur in an intra-city context. This is especially evident in low-income areas within the city because they have substantially lower broadband adoption rates. The results of this study demonstrate the importance of looking closely at issues of social exclusion of marginalized groups and the affordability of broadband access intra-city.

The Digital Divide in the Era of COVID-19: An Investigation into an Important Obstacle to the Access to the mHealth by the Citizen

“…Some initiatives have also been based on the development of surveys to thoroughly analyze the causes of the Digital Divide [ 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 ].…”

“…The second added value is represented by the survey which addresses in addition to the aspects of resources, such as those of the network [ 13 ], also other types of broad-spectrum problems.…”

“…At the time of writing this study, it emerged from a research on pubmed ((COVID-19) AND (Digital Divide) AND (Survey)) that the survey tool proved to be useful for investigating: The impact of bandwidth limitations [ 13 ] The attitude, knowledge and practice towards COVID-19 [ 14 ]. Learning methods [ 15 ].…”

Confirming validity of The Fear of COVID-19 Scale in Japanese with a nationwide large-scale sample

“…This association suggests that COVID-19 is a disaster and that utilizing the findings of disaster psychiatry can be useful in the COVID-19 epidemic. In addition, among the factors identified in this study, attention needs to be paid to older age and unemployment in particular, from the perspective of the digital divide [65]. This is because, during in the midst of the COVID-19 epidemic use of online services is growing rapidly [66]; however, some from these groups may not be able to use such services.…”

Quality Evaluation of Health Services Using the Kano Model in Two Hospitals in Peru

“…For example, due to the prominence of the “one-dimensional” attribute over other attributes, adding categories such as “high level of one-dimensional” or “slightly one-dimensional” could be included to perform a more detailed attribute categorization, as suggested by Kano et al [ 23 ]. Moreover, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, online instruments should be properly discussed and evaluated considering the socioeconomic factors and broadband access [ 67 ] in rural and urban areas in Peru.…”