Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Click here for more information on Marketing Management

Click here for more information on Marketing Management

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Journal of Macromarketing
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Stump, R. L.
Right arrow Articles by Zhan Li
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Exploring the Digital Divide in Mobile-phone Adoption Levels across Countries

Do Population Socioeconomic Traits Operate in the Same Manner as Their Individual-level Demographic Counterparts?

Rodney L. Stump

Towson University, Towson, Maryland

Wen Gong

Howard University, Washington, D.C.

Zhan Li

University of San Francisco, California

Although the adoption of mobile phones has been skyrocketing globally during the current decade, present adoption levels are quite uneven across countries. Such disparities are also found over a range of other information and communications technologies and have been characterized as a "digital divide." Although the adoption of mobile phones has been the focus of numerous studies, relatively few have systematically and comprehensively investigated the adoption of this technological innovation at the country level of analysis and over a broad range of nations. This study addresses this research gap by examining the effects of three country-level socioeconomic factors paralleling the individual-level demographic traits that in past studies have predominantly predicted early adoption of innovations. We rely on secondary data obtained from several reputable sources to examine this phenomenon across 170 nations. Theoretical, managerial, and policy implications based on our empirical findings, along with directions for future research, are presented.

Key Words: mobile telephone • country-level adoption • digital divide • information and communications technologies

Journal of Macromarketing, Vol. 28, No. 4, 397-412 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/0276146708325386
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?