Digital Exclusion

This preprint develops the concept of algorithmic abandonment as a critical and theoretical extension of social abandonment in contemporary digital society. It begins from Dr Cora M. Stack’s policy framework on loneliness, social abandonment, and Inclusive Community Belonging Hubs in Ireland, and uses Gretta Mohan’s ESRI-supported work on loneliness and mental health as an empirical Irish starting point.

The paper argues that digital capitalism, platform life, automation, artificial intelligence, and algorithmic identity systems do not merely intensify loneliness; they reorganise the conditions of belonging by replacing embodied presence with mediated, personalised, and data-producing forms of connection. It introduces the Algorithmic Abandonment Cycle as a six-stage framework and connects it to the IAAP model: Identity in the Age of Algorithmic Power.

The paper is conceptual and policy-oriented rather than empirical. It does not present new survey data, interviews, or clinical findings. Instead, it defines a new research problem, proposes operational indicators, develops future research propositions, and outlines policy principles for anti-abandonment and anti-capture design. Its central claim is that belonging should be treated as human infrastructure, and that digital tools should support embodied human connection rather than replace it.

This is a bibliographic research, through which we intend to approach the concept of social movements in a network, as well as to address their role as an expression of counterpower in contemporary society (informational or networked). It is proposed to carry out a brief theoretical reconstruction on the subject, using the sociological perspective developed by Manuel Castells. It starts from the hypothesis that this new kind of social movements, in their demands for rights triggered by the negative emotion of fear, can make use of the internet and its tools to mobilize their actions and maximize their effectiveness, reaching a greater number of people. in a shorter period of time. Cyberspace, therefore, can be used as a favorable field for real conquests (from the virtual to the real).

The rapid development of information and communication technologies has profoundly transformed the production, dissemination, and consumption of news. Within this environment, disinformation has emerged as one of the most pressing challenges for contemporary societies. Unlike misinformation, which refers to the unintentional circulation of inaccurate data, disinformation is defined as the deliberate and systematic manipulation of facts, contexts, and narratives with the aim of shaping public opinion. Its impact is not limited to political communication; rather, it extends to a wide spectrum of public life including social debates, economic reporting, cultural narratives, sports, and even entertainment news. The normalization of disinformation within the everyday news cycle threatens democratic deliberation, undermines institutional trust, and contributes to the deepening of polarization.

      This thesis investigates how disinformation manifested within the Turkish media during the summer of 2023. The selection of this period carries deliberate significance. Following the general elections, Türkiye entered a phase of intense political polarization, ongoing economic instability, and a delicate recovery from the major earthquakes that struck earlier that year. Simultaneously, public discourse became increasingly preoccupied with debates on migration and national security. Meanwhile, sports and entertainment coverage maintained strong public engagement through the spread of rumors, speculative stories, and sensational reporting. The coexistence of political tension, societal fragility, and the mass circulation of popular news renders the summer of 2023 a critical moment for understanding the ways in which disinformation infiltrates both political communication and popular culture.

      The study employs a qualitative methodology based on critical discourse analysis and framing analysis. Critical discourse analysis makes it possible to reveal the ideological dimensions of language use, the reproduction of power relations, and the strategic deployment of linguistic and visual resources. Framing analysis, in turn, focuses on the interpretive schemes through which the same event is presented differently by different outlets. Together, these two approaches enable a deeper understanding of disinformation not merely as a matter of factual accuracy, but as a discursive practice that constructs meaning through emphasis, omission, exaggeration, and narrative positioning.

      The data set consists of news articles published between June and August 2023 in three newspapers: Sabah, Sözcü and Yeniçağ. These newspapers were selected because they represent distinct ideological orientations within the Turkish press. Sabah reflects a pro-government and conservative line, Sözcü represents an oppositional and secular perspective, while Yeniçağ embodies a nationalist orientation critical of both government and mainstream opposition. This diversity provides a fertile ground for comparative analysis, enabling the study to demonstrate how disinformation strategies vary according to ideological positioning.

    The findings of the research demonstrate that disinformation is not confined to any single political camp but is rather a widespread practice across the ideological spectrum. In the case of Sabah disinformation frequently appeared in the form of selective reporting and legitimizing discourse that reinforced government narratives while downplaying critical perspectives. Sözcü on the other hand, often relied on dramatization and exaggerated headlines that amplified oppositional critiques, occasionally publishing claims without adequate verification. Yeniçağ distinguished itself by its securitization of migration and foreign policy issues, using othering strategies and unverified statistics to portray migrants as existential threats to the nation. In addition to these political and social domains, all three newspapers displayed lighter forms of disinformation in sports and entertainment news, including transfer rumors in football, speculative celebrity gossip, and sensationalist reports on private lives. Although seemingly less consequential, such practices contribute to the erosion of verification standards and foster a culture of low accountability in journalism.

    The comparative analysis reveals that each outlet employs disinformation in line with its ideological orientation: legitimization in pro-government discourse, dramatization in oppositional discourse, and securitization in nationalist discourse.Despite these differences, a common tendency emerges in all three newspapers: the prioritization of immediacy, sensationalism, and partisanship over accuracy and verification. This tendency not only reinforces polarization but also undermines the possibility of a shared public reality, thereby weakening democratic deliberation.

    The thesis argues that addressing disinformation cannot be reduced to technical fact-checking mechanisms alone. What is required is a deeper engagement with the structural and cultural dimensions of media production, including the strengthening of journalistic ethics, the development of independent editorial policies, and the promotion of media literacy among citizens. By situating the Turkish case within the global literature on disinformation, the study underscores that the problem is both local and transnational, shaped by the interaction of political, economic, and technological forces.

    In conclusion, this research contributes to the literature by providing an empirical, comparative, and period-specific analysis of disinformation in Türkiye. By examining the summer of 2023 across three ideologically diverse newspapers, it demonstrates how disinformation infiltrates multiple domains of public communication and functions as a key instrument in shaping collective perceptions. The findings underline the urgent need to address disinformation not only as a matter of truth and falsehood but as a systemic challenge that affects the quality of public life and the health of democratic societies.

ARTICLE DETAILS E-learning adoption in African higher education cannot be explained through technical access or individual user willingness alone. This article synthesizes scholarship from the Liberian, West African, and broader African higher education literature to argue that digital adoption is shaped by a recursive interaction among infrastructural conditions, pedagogical cultures, institutional histories, and postcolonial power relations. Drawing on the thesis literature base and structured around five complementary theoretical frameworks, namely the Technology Acceptance Model, Hofstede's cultural dimensions, Cultural Lag Theory, Structuration Theory, and decolonial theory, the article demonstrates how these frameworks expose different but mutually reinforcing dimensions of the same problem. Infrastructure deficits, including high data costs, unreliable electricity, and limited device ownership, remain decisive material conditions, but they acquire amplified significance precisely because they interact with collectivist learning values, high power distance, oral pedagogical traditions, post-conflict institutional fragility, and concerns about epistemic dependency. The article shows that resistance to e-learning is frequently a rational, culturally grounded critique of platform mismatch rather than evidence of backwardness or technophobia. The persistence of WhatsApp as a learning environment, despite the availability of formal platforms, provides the clearest evidence that cultural alignment determines adoption outcomes more consistently than technical sophistication does. Seven analytical themes emerge from the synthesis: the social production of skepticism, communal epistemology versus platform individualism, oral tradition as a design criterion, teacher authority and legitimacy, post-conflict distrust and institutional fragility, gendered and generational exclusion, and the recursive interaction among these dimensions. The article concludes that sustainable digital transformation in African higher education requires culturally responsive pedagogy, mobile-first design, participatory platform governance, and a decolonial rethinking of what counts as appropriate digital education.

• Engaging online. These are the skills needed for interacting with others and for accessing online content, as well as for using services. Examples include using school apps to pay for school dinners and school trips, making cashless payments, making video calls, submitting homework online, booking appointments and activities, filling out forms, and ordering prescriptions. • Managing and maintaining digital devices and data usage. These skills enable people to continue to use and get the most out of their devices for the tasks and activities outlined above. Managing data usage requires knowing how to monitor it and understanding how much data different apps use. Maintaining devices includes knowing how to clear and monitor device storage space. MDLS groups agreed on minimum critical skills for understanding and managing digital risks that enable households with children to go online safely and with confidence to participate in society. They are what support families to avoid and manage online harms such as scams and fraudulent links, identity theft, bullying, grooming, and mis/disinformation. Examples of skills for understanding and managing digital risks include:

This chapter considers how to approach and develop training or community interventions designed to develop what we call democratic education for data citizenship. Such interventions can range from supporting citizens to understand the most basic ideas such as "what is data" and how platforms use it-for example, how Google search and web-cookies workthrough to the complexities of UK and EU GDPR legislation, or how to unpick misinformation online. The goal of the chapter is not to provide a prescriptive list of "skills" nor a "one size fits all" solution. Our research (Yates et al., 2021; Carmi et al., 2020; Yates & Carmi, 2022) has demonstrated that concern about issues of data use and abuse in contemporary society is very high among citizens. At the same time awareness of the details and how to address these concerns are quite low. We also found that understanding, skills, and awareness varied greatly between different groups (

As argued throughout this volume, dis-/mis-/mal-information are a cause for growing concerns across the world (Carmi et al., 2020). Focusing on misinformation Wardle and Derakhshan (2017) argue that misinformation is 'information that is false, but not created with the intention of causing harm'. However, scholars and the media tend to use this term interchangeably in various contexts, mixing it with disinformation, malinformation, fake news (Farkas & Schou, 2018) and the idea of an infodemic (Simon & Camargo, 2021). While the exact definition of misinformation is not the topic of this paper, for the following discussion we need to highlight that the practices around it can vary quite a lot and depend on how it is applied conceptually and practically. As our own research points out (Carmi et al., 2020; Yates et al., 2020b) mis-/dis-/malinformation as technically defined by scholars are not everyday terms used by citizens. What does overlap are the concerns shared by scholars and citizens over the spread of 'misinformation' or 'fake news'. As noted in this volume and elsewhere scholars have been discussing the spread of misinformation around such things as elections, COVID-19 or the climate crisis. They have documented how people across the world are effectively bombarded with misleading messages through various media from social S. Yates (*

Despite efforts to promote media literacy provision (i.e., the support provided to develop people's media literacy within and outside formal education) in the UK, this provision remains fragmented, undersupported, and under-evaluated. Employing a case study methodology, this article explores the state of media literacy policy and provision within five areas of the UK: Birmingham and the West Midlands, Greater Manchester, Liverpool City Region, Scotland, and Wales. Based on semistructured interviews with policymakers and representatives of civil society organisations, key findings suggest that government bodies within all five areas have established digital inclusion networks, with media literacy provision piggybacking on these networks. While best practice is often based on forms of collaboration (e.g., to access target populations, co-design/co-deliver initiatives), significant barriers remain, including funding and the lack of an overarching framework for coordinating media literacy provision across the UK. The implications of these findings for research, policy, and practice are discussed.

The team would like to thank the Nuffield Foundation (www.nuffieldfoundation.org ) for funding this project as well as the support and input from many colleagues along the way. We would particularly like to thank Catherine Dennison at the Nuffield Foundation for managing the project and all members of the Advisory Group for their helpful insights throughout the project. We would like to thank our colleagues at University of Liverpool, Good Things Foundation, and Critical Research for their support, comments and encouragement. In particular we would thank Dr. Tamara West and Dr Justine Gangneux, for their contributions early on in the project, and Dr. Al Mathers and Dr. Emma Stone at Good Things for their support and input. Huge thanks to Niki McQuaid for ceaseless administrative and PA support throughout. We extend special thanks to the centre staff in the Good Things network who supported the recruitment of respondents and the management of focus groups during the constant challenges of COVID-19 lockdowns.

In this paper we examine what 'data literacy'-under various definitions-means at a time of persistent distribution of 'dis-/mis-/mal-information' via digital media. The paper first explores the definition of literacies (written, media, information, digital and data literacies) considering the various parameters and considerations they have gone through. We then examine the intersection of dis-/mis-/mal-information and 'fake-news' and these literacies. The paper explores what types of literacies are needed today and the important role of variations in citizens' social context. We highlight three main gaps in current data literacy frameworks-1. going beyond the individual; 2. critical thinking of the online ecosystem; and 3. designing skills for proactive citizens. We discuss these gaps while highlighting how we integrated these into our survey of UK citizens' data literacies as part of our Nuffield Foundation funded project-Me and My Big Data. By discussing our theoretical and methodological challenges we aim to shed light on not only how the definition of data literacy changes but also how we can develop education programmes that take into account information distortions and put proactive citizens at the centre.

1. Digital exclusion is not just about a lack of access to broadband; it covers an array of issues relating to levels of access, levels of digital skills, and educationit is about both breadth and depth of digital engagement. 2. COVID-19 lockdowns and associated public health measures have highlighted the extent and consequences of digital exclusion for individuals and households across the UK, especially in relation to education, employmentwith many people unable to work remotely from homehealth, wellbeing and access to public services. 3. Developing approaches to measuring and monitoring digital inequalities is critical to the creation of policy interventions that work towards ensuring a "100% digitally included population". A key part of this is the identification of citizens who are "limited" users of digital systems. 4. A much greater proportion of citizens are either limited or narrow users of digital services than might be expected. In the Liverpool City Region (LCR), we approximate that just under 600,000 citizens are limited or non-users of digital systems. Around 30,000 households with school age children are offline or led by limited users. 5. Digital inclusion and intervention strategies have to deliver more than cheap or free access -needing to meet citizens "where they are" and helping to build "spaces to be digital" within homes and communities. In pursuing social and economic recovery, policymakers should define a "minimum digital living standard", avoid "one size fits all" or "technology-led" solutions, and not ignore the skills needs of young people.

We argue here that data literacies and capabilities are an integral part of data justice. Based on focus group data collected as part of a 3-year empirical project research project, we find that citizens remain unaware of key aspects of the digital ecosystem, which exacerbate the power imbalance between big technology (data processors) companies and citizens (data subjects). Citizens feel concerned about the way it is operating, they do not feel confident enough to be able to address that. We find that "networks of literacy" among friends, colleagues, and trusted organizations are crucial for citizens' capabilities. These networks influence citizens' ability to convert their available means into capabilities to support civic engagement and their communities.

While most research using online (video conferencing) focus groups take for granted people's digital access and skills, in this chapter we consider work we undertook with people who have low digital literacy levels. We conducted the work during the COVID-19 pandemic and under social distancing regulations, shifting from a face-to-face workshop design to online focus groups. Our findings highlight the ways online focus groups can be successfully delivered when considering those with low digital literacy. Factors including smaller group sizes, joining remote sessions using individual devices, considering and categorising user types, pursuing follow-up questions, and providing contextual examples. These insights are useful for designing, developing, and conducting both ethical and considerate remote focus groups. We found that the literacy levels of your participants shape the way the session will run and that moving online adds another layer of complexity requiring constant adjustments and reflections. This work was part of our Nuffield Foundation funded project "Me and My Big Data: Developing Citizens Data Literacies" that was conducted between 2018-2021.

This paper presents findings on the correspondence of levels of digital systems and media use with a range of socioeconomic and demographic measures in the U.K. Most research on inequalities in regard to digital systems and media has focused on access and skills. Building on prior work (Yates and Lockley, 2018; Yates, et al., 2015) we argue that inequalities in regard to digital systems and media are better understood around types of user and their correspondence to other key social variables-rather than solely individual skills and access. The analysis presented here covers a range of key demographic variables, especially those that are markers of distinct social disadvantage. We find that those not using the Internet have distinct characteristics-predominantly around age, education and deprivation levels. We also find that those undertaking limited uses (overall limited use or a very narrow range of uses) are all predominantly from lower socioeconomic status backgrounds with variations due to age and education. The data used for the analysis is the recent U.K. Ofcom 2018-19 (n = 1,882) media literacy survey. The paper uses latent class analysis methods to inductively define user types. Multinomial and binary logistic regression are used to explore the correspondence of latent class group membership to key demographic variables. These insights have direct U.K. and international policy relevance as they are key to the development of strategies to tackle ongoing digital inequalities in U.K. society.