Latinos less likely to go online: study

By Ed Stoddard

DALLAS (Reuters) - Latino adults in the United States are less likely than their white or black counterparts to use the Internet, according to a study released on Thursday by the Pew Research Center.

The study underscores English dominance of the online world and highlights educational and income gaps between Hispanics and other Americans.

It found that 56 percent of adult Latinos in the United States reported using the Internet compared to 71 percent of white adults and 60 percent of blacks.

Education for all groups was the biggest factor determining who trawls cyber-space and who does not. If you didn't finish high school, you probably won't be reading this online.

"Nine-in-ten (89 percent) Latinos with a college degree go online, compared with 70 percent of Latinos who completed high school, and only 31 percent of Latinos who did not complete high school," said the center.

"Internet use is uniformly low for whites (32 percent), Hispanics (31 percent), and African Americans (25 percent) who have not completed high school," it added.

But 41 percent of Hispanic adults in America have not finished high school compared to one in ten whites and one in five blacks, the center said. Hispanics comprise about 14 percent of America's adult population.

"The results on education were striking. Lower education is related to a lower income and also literacy since so much of the online world is text-based," said Susannah Fox, an associate director at the Pew Research Center.

Language was another barrier. The report said it found that 76 percent of bilingual Latinos used the Internet versus 32 percent for Spanish speakers with no or limited English.

The report was based on two nationwide surveys conducted last year. One from June through October was done by bilingual interviewers and surveyed 6,016 Latino adults.

It was compared to one of almost 3,000 adults done in English only in August which was an across the board survey of the general population.

The report was issued jointly by the Pew Hispanic Center and the Pew Internet & American Life Project.