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An exploratory study of the use of the internet and E-government by older adults in the countryside of Brazil

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posted on 2025-04-16, 07:42 authored by Leonardo Filipe da Silva, Emilene Zitkus-De-AndradeEmilene Zitkus-De-Andrade, André Pimenta Freire
The ubiquity of the Internet and its technology and the increasing aging of the world’s population are ever more evident. Older users have different demands and capabilities when using the services offered in the digital environment. As a service provider to its population, the government has sought to optimize the provision of services and access to information through information and communication technology. Older adults are a relevant group of users of public services and have significant demands in some specific public services. To identify questions about the factors that promote the use, perception and barriers to the older population regarding the use of the Internet and government websites, this study was inspired by a study carried out in the United Kingdom to identify these factors. The study reports on a survey with 143 participants recruited from different geographical regions of the countryside of Brazil. The research showed that although government websites are strongly inclined to offer quality content and maintain the satisfaction of older adult users, there is still a more significant number of users who, due to low technology skills, do not use these sites or the Internet. Older citizens also had high Internet penetration and mobile device use. Lower computer literacy in the countryside of Brazil was related to factors such as gender, education level, race and sociocultural factors. A partial comparison with a study in the United Kingdom showed a lag in the use of e-government services by older adults in the countryside of Brazil.

Funding

CNPq grant number 315721/2021-9

São Paulo State Reserch Foundation grant number 2020/05187-5, FAPEMIG

Loughborough University’s Institute of Advanced Studies

History

School

  • Design and Creative Arts

Published in

Information

Volume

14

Issue

4

Publisher

MDPI

Version

  • VoR (Version of Record)

Rights holder

© The Author(s)

Publisher statement

This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Acceptance date

2023-03-14

Publication date

2023-04-06

Copyright date

2023

eISSN

2078-2489

Language

  • en

Depositor

Dr Emilene Zitkus De Andrade. Deposit date: 1 November 2024

Article number

225

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