Proposing a Survey Instrument for Measuring Operational, Formal, Information, and Strategic Internet Skills

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae, and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand, or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material. Observational studies prove to be very suitable to provide a realistic view of people's Internet skills. However, their cost and time are a strong limitation for large-scale data gathering. A useful addition to the measurement of Internet skills would be the development of survey questions for measuring Internet skills. In this contribution, potential survey measures for operational, formal, information, and strategic Internet skills were analyzed. Three steps were followed to obtain valid items; coherences between, on one hand, frequency and agreement scales and, on the other hand, the results of two large-scale performance tests (assignment completion and time spent) are measured, the Fornell and Larcker discriminant validity criterion was used to test discriminant validity of these Internet skills items, and the items are analyzed using a first-order confirmatory factor analysis. The items that resulted from the three steps might be used in future survey measures. 1. INTRODUCTION The idea behind the digital divide concept is that there are significant benefits from computer and Internet usage and that nonusage results in negative consequences. Now the diffusion of the Internet among households has reached high levels in developed countries, the binary classification of access in terms of physical access (having a computer and an Internet connection or not) is considered to have been superseded and replaced by a divide that is supposed to concentrate on a large number of more complex variables and relations. A more refined understanding of the digital divide has developed, and several conceptualizations of how to approach digital divide research One of the factors that is considered to be important in these concep-tualizations is the differential possession of digital skills. The focus of this article is on Internet skills (and not on other digital skills such …