BRATISLAVA, September 20, (WEBNOVINY) — The level of digital literacy in Slovakia has not changed over the past two years. One-quarter of the country’s population still cannot work with a PC or a mobile phone while not finances but lack of will causes this situation, as shown in the fourth annual analytical-monitoring project Digital Literacy in Slovakia presented by the think tank Institute for Public Affairs (IVO) on Tuesday.
The author of the study Marian Velsic said that digital literacy in Slovakia is higher than the European average but the situation is still far from ideal. There exists a digital abyss here, Velsic explained when there are people here willing and able to take lessons contrasting to people who refuse to learn or even do not wish to be taught. Velsic said that the situation has not changed over the past two years as people who wanted or needed to work with modern technologies already learned to do so and now are stagnating as they think they know all what they need. The author of the study says that only new technologies could force these people to make progress in the future.
According to the nationwide survey from June of this year on 1,138 respondents, over 14.76 percent of the population can be deemed digitally literate including people who declare to be familiar with at least one of 28 monitored digital skills. Velsic says that the more sophisticated the technology, application or service is, the more the share of the population drops who masters them. In association with the survey results, Velsic warned about problems that might appear in the process of introduction of electronic services in public administration, He and IVO head Grigorij Meseznikov think that the official state policy should exist in this field that should press political leaders to resolve this issue. “It is also a phenomenon of social policy, a vicious circle,” added Meseznikov.
SITA