STUDY CALLS E-MAIL THE `ISOLATION ANTIDOTE'
The Philadelphia Inquirer
May 15, 2000
Nine million adult women went on-line for the first time in the last
six months in the United States, bringing "gender parity" to the once
male-dominated Internet, according to a wide-ranging study released
this month.
The study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project also found that
the Internet is enhancing social interactions, contrary to results of
a February study by Stanford University, which said too much Internet
use turned some individuals into recluses.
"E-mail use has improved communication," said Lee Rainie, the study's
director. Instead of fostering isolation, he said, "it's being used to
enrich and deepen" people's lives and relationships.
Rainie's study said longtime and heavy Internet users--those on-line
more than two hours a day--were just as likely as anyone else to have
visited or phoned a friend or family member in the day prior to being
polled for the study.
The study called e-mail the "isolation antidote."
The Pew study was based on random March telephone interviews with
3,533 adults, of whom 1,690 were Internet users. The margin of error
for results from the Internet users was plus or minus 3 percent.
The total number of Internet users in the United States grew to 90
million during the last six months, with the addition of 9 million
women and 6.5 million men, according to the study.
Though women still do not go on-line as often as men, they are more
likely to use e-mail for staying in touch with family and friends and
for enhancing their deepest relationships, the study said.
Women are also more likely to seek health and religious information,
look for jobs and play games on-line, it said. Men are more likely to
go on-line for news, stock quotes, sports and product information.
The study found that among Internet users, 71 percent of women,
compared with 61 percent of men, said e-mail improved their
connections with close friends. More women than men said they
communicated more with friends and family since adopting e-mail.
"My husband tried to tell me how neat it was to communicate [via
e-mail] with neighbors," wrote Susan Davis, an anthropologist from
Haverford, Pa., in an e-mail Wednesday from a cybercafe in Marrakech,
Morocco, where she is leading a study trip. "But I wasn't convinced
until I got immediate replies to e-mail from friends in Cairo and
Kyrgyzstan." That was six years ago, and Davis, who is in her 50s,
said she has been hooked on e-mail ever since.
"Women, even the newcomers, are pretty quick to embrace e-mail and to
use it in this connections way and to feel good about that," Rainie
said.
The study, which was funded by a $5.9 million grant from the Pew
Charitable Trusts, found that 55 million Americans--60 percent of
those with Internet access--use the Internet daily at work, at home or
both.
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