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Canadian Rural Internet Use

This might be a bit of a duh but according to a new study released in Statistics Canada’s Rural and Small Town Canada Analysis Bulletin, people living in rural and small town Canada have lower rates of Internet use than those people living in urban areas.
Factors Associated with Internet Use: Does Rurality Matter?
Larry McKeown, Statistics Canada, and Anthony Noce and Peter Czerny, Industry Canada
“Highlights
In 2005, only 58% of residents living in rural and small town areas accessed the Internet, well below the national average. Rates in Canada’s largest urban areas ranged from 68% in Montreal to 77% in both Ottawa–Gatineau and Calgary.
This gap between rural and urban areas may reflect the interaction of other socio-economic factors or may represent another effect, such as broadband availability.
Individuals that are older, those with lower levels of education and those living in households with lower incomes were less likely to have used the Internet.
The importance of other factors associated with Internet use, such as gender and the presence of children, appears to have changed. The presence of children in a household has no statistically significant effect on an individual’s use of the Internet, while women have greater odds of using the Internet than men.”
Time for a local library press release…
Stephen

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Posted on: September 13, 2007, 2:32 pm Category: Uncategorized

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  1. I know my parents in the rural foothills of California still can’t get DSL or cable Internet service, and this definitely limits their Internet use (and makes many of the cooler technologies such as YouTube unusable). Dialup is a drag…