Mobile Trends in Low Income Communities. Monday, October 1, 12

Transcription

1 Mobile Trends in Low Income Communities

2 Overview Question, Hypothesis Smartphones: Scene, Users, vs. Desktops Graphs: Age, Income, Demographics Smartphone Internet Users Real Life Examples Limitations Solutions

3 The Question Why would a low income, inner-city school need smartphone apps to convey student information to parents?

4 The Hypothesis: 2 Birds, 1 Stone Low income families tend to access online data through apps and mobile web browsers more frequently than with desktop computers or tablets.

5 The Smartphone Scene 46% of American adults own a smartphone Now = 63% of Web traffic = generated by computers By Web traffic to decline to 46% # mobile Internet users will increase 56- fold to 788M users

6 The Smartphone Scene Smartphone adoption is highest among affluent and well-educated, the (relatively) young and non-whites 28% of those users rely on their smartphone as the primary connection to the internet

7 Smartphone Users Diverse Demographics Given: Most are well-off and educated However: Adoption by African-Americans and Hispanics is particularly high at 44% Most who rely on phone for Internet are <30 and have low incomes

8 Why Smartphone > Suitable replacement for buying computers/dsl/modem bills Difference in internet speed with modems = not big enough to justify cost Many users in urban areas already rely on a hot spot that offers WiFi Web access from a school, library, neighbor, coffee shop to get on cheaply

9 The State of Smartphone Ownership

10 Smartphone Ownership and Internet Use Smartphone owners under the age of 30, non-white smartphone users, and smartphone owners with relatively low income and education levels are particularly likely to say that they mostly go online using their phones. Most popular phones (in order): Android (common among young adults/ African-Americans), iphone, Blackberry (common among college graduates and financially well off)

11 The Demographics of Smartphone Household Income 22% - Less than $30k 40% - $30K-$49K 38$ - $50K-$74K 59% - $75K+

12 Smartphone Ownership by Household % of US adults within each group who own a smartphone, some other type of cell phone, or no cell phone

13 Who are the cell mostly smartphone internet? % of smartphone owners within each group who go online mostly using their cell phone

14 Demographic Differences in Smartphone % of smartphone owners in each group who use their phone to access the internet or

15 Meet Cherise Morris About Monticello High School senior Duplex in Esmont, 40 minutes from town Android Homework, College Applications Full-ride to Brown

16 Smartphone Limitations Difficult to format/complete: Medical forms, job application, college application, creating presentations Recent changes by wireless carriers on the way users are billed may discourage smartphone users from just relying on mobile devices Ex) Verizon charging new customers for every bit of data they consume rather than monthly plans Ex) AT&T & Verizon designed to keep users in bundled packages for multiple services (broadband home Internet + TV services)

17 Solution Increase parent engagement with educational path through advanced push notifications, attendance reporting, meal planning.

18 Study: Parent Involvement & Student Achievement Increased parent involvement is significantly related to a child s increased perception of cognitive competence Test scores Academic performance Increased parent involvement was significantly related to increased quality of student-teacher relationship

19 Takeaways Lower income Americans are more likely to rely solely on their phones to access the internet. Smartphone use in lower income families has approximately 1/3 of the market = great opportunity to create an app to bridge the gap Further study: What student information would parents be interested in? Attendance Grades Test dates, major assignments

20 Sources PIP_Smartphones.pdf Smartphone%20ownership% pdf PIP_Smartphones.pdf