Social capital communicating

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Social capital communicating

• Socquit and results from EURESCOMs P903 study
• E-Living Results Conference
• RWI Essen
• 20 - 21 January, 2004

Dr. Frank Thomas (FTR, France) Jeroen Heres (TNO,
Netherlands)
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ICTs to enhance Social Capital and Quality of
life (1)

• It is assumed that ICT will create societal
  benefits
• FP6-IST, Lisbon Council, e-europe2005 actionplan,
  etc.
• Social Capital often seen as a central mediating
  factor for enhancing Quality of Life with ICT

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ICTs to enhance Social Capital and Quality of
life (2)

• However, estimating impact of IST on Social
  Capital and Quality of life is difficult
• Effects are not straightforward
• Effects are dynamic (reciprocal)

Social Capital/ QoL
ICT use
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SOCQUIT activities

• Analyzing state of the art knowledge
• Condensation into system dynamic model
• Validation of the model by data-analysis
• Making model applicable for policy and RTD by
  creating decision support tool
• Applying the model analyzing selected topics
• ? Initiating an expert network social
  capital, quality of life and ICT

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Objectives SOCQUIT

• Supporting RTD and policy (public and industrial)
  by showing the estimated influence of (new) ISTs
  on the development of social capital and quality
  of life
• Initiate expert networks and activities in this
  subject area

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Wanna be involved in SOCQUIT?

• Mailinglist (newsletter, latest results)
• Socquit-info_at_eurescom.de
• Website
• www.eurescom.de/socquit

• Partners
• TNO (coordinator)
• Telenor
• Chimera
• Eurescom
• FTR

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Eurescom P-903

• Project 1999-2001
• Representative data about users and non-users of
  mobile phone and Internet
• focus on PRIVATE use
• 9 countries, advanced and starters
• more than 9000 respondents
• Data available for re-analysis

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The general analytical framework
Values life styles
Attitudes to ICTs
Mob
.
phone
Mob
.
phone
Adoption
Domestication
and Use
Internet
Internet
Activities
Domestication
Adoption


social networks
and Use


geographical mobility


time use
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Social network data in P903
kin
acquaintances (relations, work-, school-mates)
friends
abroad
national
local
With whom the respondents was in contact (f2f,
phone, mail)
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Dimensions of social networks

• The size of the separate networks number of kin,
  of friends, of acquaintances, of neighbours
  contacted last month
• The distance distribution of contacted kin,
  friends, acquaintances

• Communications media used
• visits,
• fixed line telephone calls,
• mobile phone calls,
• emails,
• SMS,
• letters
• by distance groups, for kin, friends, and for
  acquaintances
• The social distance to kin, friends,
  acquaintances, neighbours

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What is meant by social capital? (1)

• PUTNAM
• features of social organization, such as
  networks, norms, and trust, that facilitate
  coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit
• The stress is on collective action

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What is meant by social capital? (2)

• WOOLCOCK and the World Bank Social Capital
  Initiative
• the norms and networks that facilitate
  collective action... Any definition focus on its
  sources rather than on consequences, .. This
  approach eliminates an entity such as trust
  from the definition .. i.e. social capital makes
  most sense when it is understood as a relational
  .. rather than a psychological .. or political ..
  variable.

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How is social capital measured

• Woolcocks proposal
• bonding capital relations among family members,
  close friends and neighbours
• bridging capital relations to more distant
  friends, associates, colleagues, with similar
  socio-demographic background
• linking capital the capacity to leverage
  resources, ideas, informations from formal
  institutions beyond the community
• a multi-dimensional approach integrates the three
  forms and their dynamic combination over time
• the institutional context, especially the role of
  the state

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Influences on social capital

• communication theory and the analysis of
  sociability and ICT use at France Télécom RD
• gender
• life cycle, the birth of the first child
• residential relocation
• besides
• income education
• place of residence
• usage characteristics length of use, general
  intensity of use, technical expertise

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The spatial boundedness of social capital
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and the temporal boundedness of social capital
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Bridging bonding capital and combined ICT use
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Segmentation of ICT usage

• The results
• age
• household composition, gender
• education
• bridging capital
• no influence of length of residence
• limited influence of national contexts
• no influence of bonding capital

• The hypothesis
• social capital
• socio-demography
• gender age
• life cycle
• national context
• length of residence