Digital Natives: Where is the Evidence?

In Digital Natives: Where is the Evidence?,  Ellen Helsper and Rebecca Eynon try to untangle what it means to be a "digital native" and, more specifically, whether this is determined by age, experience using the Internet and breadth of use of the Internet. They define a digital native as someone who multitasks, has access to a range of new technologies, is confident in their use of technologies, uses the Internet as a first port of call for information, and uses the Internet for learning.

Their findings, based on data collected in the UK,  are consistent with ours and contribute to growing body of evidence that debunks the popular net generation claims about a generation transformed by its immersion in the digital world. According to Helsper and Eynon, their data make it very clear "that it is not helpful to define digital natives and immigrants as two distinct, dichotomous generations. While there were differences in how generations engaged with the Internet, there were similarities across generations as well, mainly based on how much experience people have with using technologies....Internet use lies along a continuum of engagement instead being a dichotomous divide between users and non-users."

Helsper & Enyon conclude with a call for research that goes further than simply surveying users, that looks at what people are actually doing online, and how the use of digital technologies is connected to learning: "Reporting of use of the Internet is not the same as understanding the learning that may take place as a result of this use."

Unfortunately this article is published in the British Educational Research Journal which means, unless you have access through your institution, you will have to pay to read the article.

Alone Together

 "We make our technologies, and they, in turn, shape us. So, of every technology we must ask, Does it serve our human purposes? - a question that causes us to reconsider what these purposes are. Technologies in every generation, present opportunities to reflect on our values and direction." - Sherry Turkle, Alone Together, p. 19

Amidst all the buzz and hype surrounding the social media "revolution", comes the refreshingly profound and thoughtful voice of Sherry Turkle. Her just-released book, Alone Together takes a critical look at how our digital technologies are shaping our lives. Turkle worries that while digital technology enables us to connect with each other more easily, it also shapes the nature of those connections, favoring superficiality, and the "new language of abbreviation in which letters stand for words and emoticons for feelings." So, while we are increasingly connected by digital technology, Turkle suggests we may actually be more alone: "in intimacy, new solitudes".

I have only just begun to read this book but so far I am impressed with Turkle's provocative and original perspective. I will have more complete review when I have finished the book.

Presentation to IT Silgo - Ireland

My presentation to the Institute of Technology in Silgo, Ireland is available here:
Separating Fact from Fiction in the Digital Generation Discourse.

Separating Fact from Fiction in the Digital Generation Discourse

I will be making an online presentation on our digital learners research to Institute of Technology Silgo, in Ireland on January 19 at 4:10 pm GMT (8:10 am PST). You can find out more about the presentation and how to register at:
Separating Fact from Fiction in the Digital Generation Discourse

Digital Learners in Higher Education: Generation is Not the Issue

The idea that generation explains how young people use digital technologies and that these "digital natives" are fundamentally different from the older "digital natives" in how they use and understand technology has been successfully debunked. Our work and in particular, the article, Digital Learners in Higher Education: Generation is Not the Issue, is part of the significant body of research that has exposed the superficiality of the techno-determinist rhetoric of the popular futurists (e.g., Tapscott, Prensky, Palfrey & Gasser and others). This article has been accepted for publication in the Canadian Journal of Learning & Technology but will probably not be published until sometime in 2011 so we are making a pre-publication version of the article available now.

We and others (e.g., see special issues of Journal of Computer Assisted Learning and Learning, Media & Technology) have moved beyond the simplistic generational perspective and have begun to explore the deeper and more important issues related to how higher education learners understand and use digital technologies in different parts of their lives. Stay tuned for more on this.

Learning, the Net Generation and Digital Natives

The journal, Learning, Media and Technology has just published an issue with  focus on the theme, Learning, the Net Generation and Digital Natives. I have only had chance to scan the articles but it looks like a very interesting issue that adds to the growing body of research that is helping to provide us with an evidence-based understanding of how young people are using digital technologies and how leisure and academic uses are interconnected. The issue is edited by Chris Jones from the UK Open University, Institute of Educational Technology.

From the editorial:

The articles in this issue paint a complex picture of change amongst young people, a picture at odds with the idea of a Net Generation composed of Digital Natives. They address the ways that leisure and study activities intertwine and suggest new methods for research need to be adopted to complement the predominantly survey methods currently deployed. The articles show that young people at school and university use technologies in ways that are related to their purposes and exhibit a diversity that contrasts with the idea of a sharp generational change. The articles agree that there are significant age-related changes but they suggest that these changes are mediated by the active appropriation of technology by young people who act purposively and in relation to influential institutional contexts.

Unfortunately, the journal is not open access so if you don't have access through your institution, you will have to pay to read this publically-funded research.

Thanks to Tannis Morgan for bringing this to my attention.

The Digital Future of Higher Education

The evidence is clear: when it comes to the use of digital technologies in higher education, generation is not the issue. Portraying technology use in generational terms is simplistic and potentially costly. This is the conclusion of our research and of many other studies. But that doesn't mean our work is done. We still need to gain a fuller and deeper understanding of what impact the pervasive use of digital technologies is having on students and their learning. This is what we are now focusing on in the second phase of our Digital Learners in Higher Education research project. And it also one of the themes of an interesting one day conference that is being organized by Norm Friesen at Thompson Rivers University. Debating the Digital Future of Higher Education will feature keynote presentations by Anya Kamenetz, author of DIY University, and Professor Michael A. Peters, author of Knowledge Economy, Development and the Future of Higher Education and a debate on the net gen issue with yours truly.

The conference takes place Feb 22. Check out the website for details. Early bird registration starts from only $99.

Special Issue of Journal of Computer Assisted Learning

The Journal of Computer Assisted Learning has published a special issue on the Net Generation. It contains four excellent articles that move beyond simplistic notions of generation and provide a more nuanced and theoretically-grounded understanding of digital technology use. Unfortunately JCAL is not an open access journal so unless you have access to an institutional subscription, you will have to pay to read these articles. Why do we keep giving away our publically-funded intellectual property so publishers can sell it back to us?

Visitors and Residents

One of the problems with The Net Gen discourse is that assumes that all people in this age group (which is not consistently defined) have the same set of characteristics, skills and aptitudes, particularly with respect to digital technologies. This simplistic, generationally and technologically deterministic perspective hides much more important differences in how people use and understand technology and particularly the social web. David White's visitors and residents principle is an excellent example of how moving beyond age provides us with an opportunity to get a deeper understanding of how people use and understand digital technology. I am a bit uncomfortable with labeling because people rarely fall neatly into the conceptual boxes we create but this framework is a much more meaningful way of thinking about the use of the social web and as David White emphasizes, it should be viewed more as spectrum rather than two discrete categories.

According to White: "The resident is an individual who lives a percentage of their life online. The web supports the projection of their identity and facilitates relationships. These are people who have an persona online which they regularly maintain. This$ persona is normally primarily in a social networking sites but it is also likely to be in evidence in blogs or comments, via image sharing services etc"

"The Visitor is an individual who uses the web as a tool in an organised manner whenever the need arises. They may book a holiday or research a specific subject. They may choose to use a voice chat tool if they have friends or family abroad. Often the Visitor puts aside a specific time to go online rather than sitting down at a screen to maintain their presence at any point during the day."

The research that David White and colleagues are doing suggests that age has nothing to do with whether you are a visitor or a resident. Once again, generation is not the issue.

Watch David White's engaging presentation on the visitors and residents principle.


Thanks to Terry Anderson for bringing this to my attention.

Generational Explanation is a Gross Oversimplification

There is a growing body of solid research-based evidence that contradicts the popular view of the digital native as part of a technologically-savvy generation that differs fundamentally from previous generations. The latest evidence comes from a special issue of the Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, Desribing or Debunking: The Net Generation and Digital Natives. The four articles in the special edition reject the popular view as a gross oversimplification and argue that the issues at play are more complex and nuanced that we have been led to believe. The articles show that generation is not a useful or accurate variable and that technology adoption and use is much more varied within the net generation age group than the popular discourse suggests. For example, in the article, Beyond Natives and Immigrants: Exploring Types of Net Generation Students, Kennedy et al. identified four statistically robust types of student technology users: Power, Ordinary, Irregular, Basic. All of these were within the net generation age group. This, they say, confirms previous research that found widespread diversity in students' technology experiences. They conclude: "the clear implications of these findings is that large scale changes in curriculum or teaching approach based on assumptions about the technology experience of this generation of students as suggestted, for example, by Prensky (2001a) snd by Oblinger (2008) cnnot be justified."


I haven't read the other three articles but, based on the abstracts, they appear to provide some new and more useful insights into the issue.

Table of Contents:
Beyond the ‘digital natives’ debate: Towards a more nuanced understanding of students' technology experiences, S. Bennett and K. Maton
Beyond natives and immigrants: exploring types of net generation students,
G. Kennedy, T. Judd, B. Dalgarno and J. Waycott
Net generation students: agency and choice and the new technologies,
C. Jones and G. Healing
Debunking the ‘digital native’: beyond digital apartheid, towards digital democracy,
C. Brown and L. Czerniewicz

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jca.2010.26.issue-5/

The only shortcoming of this special journal issue is it is not open access.