Let's dispel a taboo: young internet users, or "digital natives" as we sometimes prefer to define them in sociological classifications, are not as connected to the internet as is commonly believed. Or anyway they are not, especially in the most advanced countries, so much more than the rest of the population. In fact, the "Y Generation" has a greater predisposition to the use of new technologies, as it was born between the 80s and 2000 in a now digitalized environment, but this does not mean it has a monopoly.
To reveal it is a relationship of the US university Georgia Tech: defining "digital natives" as individuals who have regularly used the internet for at least five years, we realize that in reality they are only 30% of young people between 15 and 24 years old in the world. Far from a generational phenomenon, therefore, and this also applies to the more developed countries: while it is not surprising that in Bangladesh only 4,7% of the under 24s can be defined as internet addicted (compared to 99,6% of their peers in Korea of the South), the real surprise is to note that in rich countries such as France and the United States, where they are 91 and 96%, they are not so much more than citizens of the more adult groups.
In fact, the Georgia Tech study speaks of a ratio of just 1,2 times higher, which in the poorest countries is at least double (2,3 times in Bangladesh). “We are all fascinated by the use of technology in the USA and in Scandinavia – the professor who conducted the research, Michael Best, explains to the NY Times -, but it is actually in the least developed countries that this phenomenon has the most impact. The places where young people are most interested in technology are precisely the places where they are least interested in technology”.
