The digital gender gap in secondary school: differences in self-perceived competence and attitude towards technology

The digital gender gap, defined as the difference between men and women in the use and exploitation of digital technologies (DTs), translates into an unfavorable social and economic scenario for women. Responding to this reality means exploring the development of Digital Competence (DC) and the attitude towards the use of DTs, to offer training that truly reduces possible differences between genders. This article investigates gender differences, both in self-perceived DC, and in the attitude towards the use of DTs throughout secondary education in Spain. The research is quantitative, with a survey design. The sample is made up of 3249 boys and girls, students in the 2nd and 4th year of ESO and the 2nd year of upper secondary school. The Digitalis-ESO questionnaire measures self-perceived DC (& alpha;=.908), attitude (& alpha;=.914), and other demographic data. A descriptive analysis of frequencies, a comparative and correlational study, using chi-squared, t-tests and Pearson correlations, is performed. Boys report higher levels of DC perception and attitude than girls, with medium effect sizes. Furthermore, DC improves with the course for both genders, while attitude worsens significantly for girls. The detail of the DC items indicates that girls perceive themselves as more skilled in academic and communication-related activities, while boys believe they excel in technical activities. Finally, the analysis of attitude towards the use of DTs shows a strong incidence on the self-perception of DC, both for boys and girls. These results confirm the existence of a digital gap in favor of boys, thus training and support actions are necessary for girls, especially in technical aspects of DC, which also help them improve their attitude towards the use of DTs.