
How ICT Development Since the 1990s Has Contributed Differently to Gender Equality in High-income, Middle-income and Low-income Countries
- 1 Dongguan University of Technology
- 2 University of California Davis
- 3 California Crosspoint High School
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Gender inequality is a global issue. It is well known that ICT (Information and Communications Technology) development has a place in promoting gender equality, and many international organizations that aim to promote gender equality have adopted measures on ICT expansion in the process of promoting gender equality. Since the 1990s, ICT has been introduced almost globally, and the lack of access to ICT has improved even in the more disadvantaged regions. The existing literatures have answered positively to the question of whether ICT has contributed to the development of gender equality, but no studies have been conducted to determine whether ICT development has had a different impact on the promotion of gender equality in high-income, middle-income, and low-income countries, and middle- and low- income countries are at different stages of development. If it is true that development of gender equality in middle- and low-income countries has been deeply influenced by ICT development, it can be assumed that the continued promotion of ICT development is effective in reducing gender gap in these countries. Therefore, in this paper, GDI (Gender Development Index), HDI (Human Development Index), GGGI (Global Gender Gap Index), investment in ICT with private participation (current US$), mobile cellular subscriptions, individuals using the Internet (% of population), and fixed broadband subscriptions were used to explore whether the development of ICT since the 1990s has had a differential impact on the development of gender equality in the United States, Norway, Mexico, China, Mali, and Yemen. The final result showed that the contribution of ICT development to gender equality since the 1990s is more significant in middle- and low-income countries, and the positive correlation between ICT development and gender equality is more pronounced in middle- and low-income countries.
Keywords
gender equality, gender gap, human development, information and communication technology, information diffusion
[1]. World Economic Forum, (2022). Global Gender Gap Report 2006-2022. https://www.weforum.org/search?query=global+gender+gap+report
[2]. Gu, H. (2013) ICT, Gender Equality and Education in Rural China——The Empirical Evidence from CHNS Data. POPULATION & DEVELOPMENT, 19: 47-56.
[3]. Gurumurthy, A., (2004). Gender and ICTs: Overview Report. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/297737202_Gender_and_ICTs_Overview_Report
[4]. Marcelle, G.M., (2000). Transforming Information & Communications Technologies for Gender Equality.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237447040_Transforming_Information_Communications_Technologies_for_Gender_Equality
[5]. Sicat, M., Xu, A., Mehetaj, E., Ferrantino, M., Chemutai, V. (2020). Leveraging ICT Technologies in Closing the Gender Gap. Leveraging ICT Technologies in Closing the Gender Gap (worldbank.org)
[6]. UNCTAD, (2017). INFORMATION ECONOMY REPORT 2017. DIGITALIZATION, TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT. http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/ier2017_overview_en.pdf
[7]. GSM Association, (2018). Connected women - The mobile gender gap report. https://www.gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/wpcontent/uploads/2018/04/GSMA_The_Mobile_Gender_Gap_Report_2018_32pp_WEBv7.pd
[8]. Malmstrom, M., Wincent, J., (2018). The digitization of banks disproportionately hurts women entrepreneurs.https://hbr.org/2018/09/research-the-digitization-of-banks-disproportionately-hurts-women-entrepreneurs
[9]. Akerman, A., Gaarder, I., Mogstad, M. (2015) The skill complementarity of broadband internet. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 130: 1781-1824.
[10]. Siddiq, F., Scherer, R. (2019) Is there a gender gap? A meta-analysis of the gender differences in students’ ICT literacy. Educational research review, 27: 205-217.
[11]. Voyer, D., Voyer, S. D. (2014) Gender differences in scholastic achievement: a meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin, 140(4): 1174.
[12]. Aesaert, K., Van Braak, J. (2015) Gender and socioeconomic related differences in performance based ICT competences. Computers & Education, 84: 8-25.
[13]. Wang, W. Jian, X. Zhang, C.(2022) The Gender Equality Paradox: Global Digital Gender Divide and Its Cultural Explanations—A Cross Country (Region) Analysis Based on PIS2018. Studies in Foreign Education, 49: 19-35.
[14]. Genlott, A. Grönlund, Å. (2016) Closing the gaps-Improving literacy and mathematics by ict-enhanced collaboration. Computer & Education, 99: 68-80.
[15]. UNDP, (2021). Human Development Report. https://hdr.undp.org/gender-development-index#/indicies/GDI
[16]. The World Bank, (2022). World Development Indicators. https://databank.worldbank.org/source/world-development-indicators
[17]. The Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs, (2020). Country Profile of Mali. https://g3ict.org/country-profile/mali
[18]. International Telecommunication Union, (2022). DataHub of Mali. https://datahub.itu.int/data/?e=MLI&c=&i=
[19]. Dumas, J.H.A., (2002). ICT AND GENDER EQUALITY POLICY: LESSONS OF THE MALI TELECENTRES. https://www.proquest.com/openview/3928ee35654f31071fd806d64a246af2/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y
[20]. Taufiq Hali Ghilam Al-madhagy, (2013). ICT Policy in Yemen. https://www.slideshare.net/taufiqghilan/ict-policy-yemen
[21]. Mareai, B., (2018). REALITY OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN THE REPUBLIC OF YEMEN. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323586322_REALITY_OF_INFORMATION_AND_COMMUNICATION_TECHNOLOGY_IN_THE_REPUBLIC_OF_YEMEN
[22]. The Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs, (2020). Country Profile of The Republic of Yemen. https://g3ict.org/country-profile/yemen-republic-of
[23]. International Telecommunication Union, (2022). DataHub of Yemen. https://datahub.itu.int/data/?e=YEM&c=
[24]. International Chamber of Commerce, (2017). 3 Reasons Why ICT Matters for Gender Equality. https://iccwbo.org/media-wall/news-speeches/3-reasons-ict-matters-gender-equality/
Cite this article
Ye,Y.;Feng,X.;Li,S. (2023). How ICT Development Since the 1990s Has Contributed Differently to Gender Equality in High-income, Middle-income and Low-income Countries. Lecture Notes in Education Psychology and Public Media,11,293-310.
Data availability
The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study will be available from the authors upon reasonable request.
Disclaimer/Publisher's Note
The statements, opinions and data contained in all publications are solely those of the individual author(s) and contributor(s) and not of EWA Publishing and/or the editor(s). EWA Publishing and/or the editor(s) disclaim responsibility for any injury to people or property resulting from any ideas, methods, instructions or products referred to in the content.
About volume
Volume title: Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Educational Innovation and Philosophical Inquiries
© 2024 by the author(s). Licensee EWA Publishing, Oxford, UK. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. Authors who
publish this series agree to the following terms:
1. Authors retain copyright and grant the series right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this
series.
2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the series's published
version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgment of its initial
publication in this series.
3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and
during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See
Open access policy for details).