Home computer ownership and educational outcomes of adolescents in Greece

ABSTRACT

We investigate the impact of home computer ownership on educational outcomes during adolescence. Using longitudinal survey data from Greece, we focus on the timing of exposure to home computers for children aged 14–18 and find that those without computer access have a 10 percentage point higher probability of dropping out of school compared to those with access. Employing a panel event study framework, we show that years of schooling increase in periods after the exposure to a personal computer at home. Our results suggest that disparities in computer access may affect significantly the human capital development during adolescence.

KEYWORDS:

• Education
• technology diffusion
• human capital

JEL CLASSIFICATION:

• I24
• O33
• J24

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Editor and the two anonymous referees for their valuable comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 We note that our paper is not an experimental study since it does not evaluate any relevant policy as many other papers do in the spirit of the ‘One Laptop per Child’ program.

2 Based on the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) data, in 2005, the percentage of households having a computer was 55.3 percent, in developed countries, and 15.6 in developing countries, but in 2019, the percentage of households having a computer increased to 79 percent in developed countries and to 36.1 in developing countries. According to the EU-SILC dataset, the computer access penetration rate of the Greek households was 27.9 percent in 2005 and 62.7 in 2019. Similar trends are reported regarding the internet access.

3 While this study examines the availability of home computers, school-level factors may also have a significant impact and cannot be fully controlled for by household characteristics. For example, whether a child attends a public or private school, or a vocational school, could greatly affect their actual access to computers. Unfortunately, due to limitations in the available data, we were unable to incorporate this valuable information into our analysis.

4 In Greece formal education is divided into three stages. The first refers to primary education, lasting six years from ages 6 to 12, the second includes compulsory lower secondary education (called Gymnasium) lasting three years from ages 12 to 15, and non-compulsory upper secondary education (called Lyceum or high school) lasting three years from ages 16 to 18.

5 It is important to acknowledge that there can be other confounders such as household shocks or health shocks that may affect the educational outcomes of children. However, in our study, we are unable to measure or account for these time-varying confounders.

Additional information

Funding

This research is co-financed by Greece and the European Union (European Social Fund - ESF) through the Operational Programme Human Resources Development, Education and Lifelong Learning in the context of the project ‘Strengthening Human Resources Research Potential via Doctorate Research’ (MIS-5000432), implemented by the State Scholarships Foundation (IKY).