Skip to main content

Digital Participation

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Gerontology and Population Aging

Synonyms

Digital divide; Information and communication technology (ICT); Social exclusion; Social participation

Definition

The term digital participation refers to the active involvement in digital society through the use of modern information and communication technology (ICT), such as the Internet. This participation includes access to not only the Internet but also various online services and content. Non-participation in the digital world could lead to a feeling of social exclusion, whereas a feeling of social inclusion may be induced by having access to the Internet as well as the willingness and skills to use it.

Overview

Digital technologies pervade all aspects of our lives because of high levels of technological innovation and the diffusion of ICT (Castells 2010). The Internet is one of the most important examples of modern digital technology. As Internet access has become widespread across the globe, a digital gap between generations has been observed in empirical studies...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

References

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alexander Seifert .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Section Editor information

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Seifert, A., Rössel, J. (2019). Digital Participation. In: Gu, D., Dupre, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Gerontology and Population Aging. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69892-2_1017-1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69892-2_1017-1

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69892-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69892-2

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Biomedicine and Life SciencesReference Module Biomedical and Life Sciences

Publish with us

Policies and ethics