Gender Differences in the Usage and Attitudes toward the Internet among Student Teachers in a Public Malaysian University

Abstract

The problems of gender disparity in the usage and attitude towards the Internet have received considerable interest among researchers. Most findings have revealed that females are at a disadvantage compared to their male counterparts where Internet usage is concerned. They have unequal access, a low rate of usage and exhibit negative attitudes towards the Internet (Nachmias et al., 2000;Madell & Muncer, 2004). Prompted by these observations, this study was carried out to investigate the gender disparity in Internet usage and the attitudes among 152 student teachers (80 females and 72 males) at a public Malaysian university (Universiti Putra Malaysia). The results of this study revealed no gender disparity in Internet usage; the female student teachers were found to spend as much time using the Internet as their male counterparts. These results accordingly contradicted the common findings of other researchers. The results also revealed that the students exhibited positive attitudes toward the Internet regardless of gender, again in contradiction to most other findings. Possible reasons and the implications of these findings will be elaborated and discussed.

On the Front Lines: Educating Teachers about Bullying and Prevention Methods

“…They saw that students were being isolated and excluded by their peers and identified this as a common form of bullying. Indeed, social exclusion as the act of "deliberately not allowing a person into a group (Lagerspetz et al, 1988;Naylor et al, 2006;Luan et al, 2008)". Figure 1 shows how educators recognize bullying.…”

Sexting, Texting, Cyberbullying and Keeping Youth Safe Online

“…Prevalence and impact of cyberbullying: Li (2006) and Luan et al (2008) found that cyberbullying is prevalent in our schools, that over a third of the cyber victims had been harassed multiple times and that lose to half of the cyber bullies had bullied others more than three times using electronic means. Ybarra et al (2006) support findings with their own findings that with traditional bullying, boys are more likely to bully than girls, however with online bullying, the incidents are equal.…”

Malaysian Y Generation Consumer Research: Does Gender and Technology Literacy affirmative towards E-commerce activities?

“…Another study supported the issue about gender and attitudes towards internet had been pointed out by Madell and Muncer in (2004), from their research discovered that males prefer to use internet, and mostly they are having own their own email addresses, web site, and they have spent longer hours contrast to the opposite gender. In line with Madell and Muncer (2004), a study conducted in Malaysia reported that male respondent spent more hours in the internet (Luan, Fung, & Atan, 2008). Another study done in China and United Kingdom also reported that in general respondent agreed that internet is useful to gain information, however men respondents indicated positive attitude towards internet (Li & Kirkup, 2007).…”