Parents More Likely To Use The Internet

from the is-that-so? dept

The folks over at the Pew Internet and American Life Project (who seem to come out with a new internet related study every week or so), have found that parents are more likely than non-parents to have an internet connection (and to use other high tech gadgets). My first reaction is to wonder what sort of control group was used in this study. If the "parents" are older than the "non-parents" then that's not much of a surprise. Assuming most non-parents are somewhat younger than parents, it would suggest that the parents are more established and more well-off, such that they can afford gadget-related luxuries more. The study also suggests, though, that the reason is that parents believe the internet can help their children do better in life. At the same time, though, the non-parents who do use the internet tend to use it a lot more than the parents. This, of course, is also not surprising - since the parents need to spend more time actually taking care of their kids (while, the non-parents can spend their time using online dating sites to try to shift their way into the parent group).