Digital Literacy Report: Advantages, Disadvantages and Approaches

This report provides a comprehensive overview of digital literacy, examining its definition, importance, advantages, and disadvantages. It delves into the core capabilities required for individuals to navigate and create information across digital platforms, emphasizing the role of mobile phones in evaluating digital literacy. The report outlines the benefits, such as time-saving, faster learning, and cost-effectiveness, while also addressing drawbacks like lack of source credibility and potential for distraction. Furthermore, it explores socio-technical approaches, including communication systems, online classrooms, and online book-sharing platforms, which facilitate digital literacy. The report highlights the significance of digital literacy in today's technological world, particularly within education, and its impact on digital citizenship and closing digital divides.

Running head: DIGITAL LITERACY
Digital Literacy
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note:

1
DIGITAL LITERACY
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Discussion..................................................................................................................................2
Digital Literacy......................................................................................................................2
Importance of Digital Literacy...............................................................................................3
Advantages of Digital Literacy..............................................................................................4
Disadvantages of Digital Literacy..........................................................................................5
Socio Technical Approaches for Digital Literacy..................................................................6
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
References..................................................................................................................................9

2
DIGITAL LITERACY
Introduction
Digital literacy is stated as the major capability of any individual to search, evaluate
as well as compose clear and relevant information via writing or any other medium on several
digitalized platforms. In recent days, the mobile phones have turned out to be extremely
effective and efficient foe evaluating digital literacy (Pinto, Cordon & Diaz, 2010). The
following literature review outlines a brief discussion on digital literacy and its importance.
The major advantages as well as disadvantages of digital literacy would be described in this
report. Moreover, the socio technical approaches for this specific technology would also be
explained in this report.
Discussion
Digital Literacy
According to Mackey and Jacobson (2011), digital literacy can be defined as the
method of utilizing, consuming as well as sharing of digital data. This digital literacy is the
core ability of using the information and communication technologies for finding, evaluating,
creating and communicating confidential data after requiring both technical and cognitive
skills (Park, 2013). The most significant example of digital literacy is that when any
individual is reading any book on Kindle, he or she is eventually considering the accuracy
and perfectness of news report that is being linked within the newsfeed of social media or
creation as well as sharing of YouTube video, when displaying digital literacy. It refers to
encompassing of the wider range of new technologies and also the technology that is being
utilized for the purpose of accessing that particular lesson. The major signs of being digitally
literate individual significantly involves having the capability of finding the appropriate tools
such as smart phones, mobile tablets and the Internet for consuming information or sharing
and creating contents for others (Meyers, Erickson & Small, 2013). Any individual, who has

3
DIGITAL LITERACY
the core capability of using technology for obtaining and sharing of information is termed as
digitally literate.
Importance of Digital Literacy
As per Goodfellow and Lea (2013), digital literacy has become one of the most
important and significant requirement in today’s technological world. In the field of
education, this is the newest chapter that is being followed by several schools, colleges and
their respective students. It has a deeper understanding of the various communal issues that
are eventually emerging out of the digital technologies. This type of literacy helps to create a
major awareness of the standard that is governing online behaviour. The vital thinking skill is
being considered for the ultimate test (Hartley, 2017). Thus, it is termed as the proper
combination of critical thinking, wider knowledge of several digital tools and social
engagement.
The individuals, who are digitally literate are also termed as digital citizens. Another
importance of digital literacy is that it helps to move beyond Google. Although, Google is a
powerful tool and the individuals, who have the access to any computer as well as the
Internet connection, eventually have the ability for finding the answers for any question like
simple or complex problems. Mohammadyari and Singh (2015) state that, evaluation is much
easier with this type of literacy and creativity is enhanced majorly. When these students get a
deep understanding of the answers that are being found, the creative applications of the
knowledge are present here. For students in academic field, cyber bullying is restricted and
thus social norms are maintained eventually. Digital literacy helps to teach these distinct
social norms or regulations easily and promptly. Moreover, the digital divisions are being
closed substantially with such literacy (Greene, Seung & Copeland 2014). As the conceptions
of digital world are being expanded, digital literacy is extremely important for the
technological world.

4
DIGITAL LITERACY
Advantages of Digital Literacy
The most significant and noteworthy advantages of digital literacy are as follows:
i) Saves Time: The first and the foremost advantage of digital literacy is that it saves
time. Being digitally literate could easily save valuable time for the tasks that are to be done
(Blikstad-Balas, 2015). Due to such time effectiveness, digital literacy has become extremely
popular for the world.
ii) Helps in Learning Fast: The second important and significant benefit of digital
literacy is that it helps to learn faster without any complexities.
iii) Cost Effectiveness: Digital literacy does not incur huge cost and even saves the
costs of transportation. Thus, it is termed as cost effective in nature and is also responsible for
providing efficiency for that particular individual.
iv) Provides Safer Technology: Since, the Internet connection is considered as one of
the most unsafe technology and there is a chance of data theft (Murray & Pérez, 2014).
However, digital literacy provides safer technology to the individuals.
v) Helps in Keeping Connected: When the social media has taken off, most of the
individuals have started debating the significant effects of having on the original
relationships, digital literacy helps in keeping connected to the other people.
vi) Helps in Taking Better Decisions: Digital literacy helps to clear the significant
doubts for any individual and hence it is much effective for undertaking efficient and better
decisions.
vii) Makes Technology Savvy: Digital literacy is responsible for making the
individuals highly technology savvy in comparison to the others and thus they get better
effectiveness in technological knowledge.

5
DIGITAL LITERACY
Disadvantages of Digital Literacy
In spite of having such distinctive and important advantages, there are some of the
major disadvantages that make this digital literacy vulnerable for the respective individuals.
These significant and noteworthy disadvantages of digital literacy are given below:
i) Lack of Credibility as well as Validation of Sources: According to Tan (2013), the
first and the foremost disadvantage of the digital literacy is that there is lack of credibility as
well as validation of sources. Since, this type of knowledge is produced from the Internet
sources, there is always a high chance that the data or the information is not up to the mark
and accurate. Due to this particular issue, the respective individual gets superficial data and
hence his or her knowledge is not proper.
ii) Cost of Equipment: The second important and significant disadvantage of this
digital literacy is the higher cost of equipment (Colwell, Hunt-Barron & Reinking, 2013).
Although the implementation or usage of equipment for digital literacy is much lower, the
cost of equipment is extremely higher and it is not possible for every individual to afford it
easily.
iii) Easy Cheating: Another important and noteworthy disadvantage of the digital
literacy for students is easier cheating. The students due to the constant usage of Internet
connection, gets scope for cheating and thus their education is hampered.
iv) Lesser Discovery Thinking: The third distinct demerit of digital literacy is that it
provides lesser discovery thinking. Since, everything is available online, there is less scope
for the individuals to think innovatively and thus
v) More Distractions: Voogt et al. (2013) has started that due to the involvement of
technology in education, digital literacy is responsible for providing more distractions to the
students or those individuals. These distractions are hence vulnerable for them.

6
DIGITAL LITERACY
vi) Dependency on Technology: The complete dependency on technology is the next
important and significant disadvantage of digital literacy. This type of literacy could not be
obtained without any involvement of technology and hence it becomes a major requirement
for digital literacy. No individual could be digitally literate if that specific person does not
have access to any digital device and Internet connection, hence making them completely
dependent.
vii) Lack of Availability to Students: The seventh important and noteworthy
disadvantage of the digital literacy is the lack of availability of students (Thompson et al.,
2016). Since, they complete their tasks via online and hence the students are not available
eventually. This often becomes a major issue for them and their teachers.
Socio Technical Approaches for Digital Literacy
This type of digital literacy is being evaluated by composition, grammar or typing
skills of that particular individual. He or she even has the core ability of producing writings,
designs, audio and images with the help of technology. As per Pangrazio (2016), previously,
digital literacy focused on the digitalized skills as well as stand alone computers; however
due to the advancement in the utilization of the social media and the Internet connection,
focus has been shifted to the mobile devices. Digital literacy is also distinguished as being a
major competency with computer assisted tools and technologies for that specific medium,
which substantially predates the ubiquity of the personalized computers (Hinrichsen &
Coombs, 2014). This computer literacy even covers few of the most important topics like
numerical analysis, Boolean logic and information security that are extremely important to
the computer literacy, although does not have the ubiquitous analog skills, predated to them.
The socio technical approach or system within any organizational development is the
approach for complicated organizational work designing, which could easily recognize or

7
DIGITAL LITERACY
identify the proper interaction within technology and people. The complex infrastructures are
being checked and interactions are observed with the human behaviour (Murray & Pérez,
2014). These socio technical systems eventually pertain to those specified theories that are
regarding the socialized aspects of society, people as well as technical aspects of the
organizational processes. There are several approaches of socio technical systems for
pertaining digital literacy. The best example of this particular approach is the software based
technology that is incrementally shaping the social as well as economic field and the
subsequent requirement for becoming more effective helps in viewing the computer science
elements like algorithms. Digital literacy or information literacy is considered as a basic
practice of socio technology (Mohammadyari & Singh, 2015). As socio technical approach is
responsible for recognition of the interaction between individuals and technologies, it is
extremely effective for digital literacy. The most significant approaches of socio technology
are as follows:
i) Implementing Socio Technical System for Communication: The first and the
foremost approach of social technology is the proper implementation of socio technical
systems for accurate communication with other individuals. As per Hartley (2014), the
electronic mails, blogs as well as social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are the
most popular examples of such systems, which could be effective for digital literacy.
Moreover, the complications regarding communications are also resolved with this approach.
ii) Starting of Online Classrooms: Online classroom is the second approach of socio
technology for pertaining digital literacy. These types of classrooms is the perfect example of
technology and social approach. The students get basic knowledge from these classrooms and
the teachers could easily teach them with the help of technology (Meyers, Erickson & Small,
2013). Moreover, the students would also get an online learning environment, hence social
environment is maintained with technology. Thus, they are becoming digitally literate. The

8
DIGITAL LITERACY
most important advantage of this type of classroom is that it saves time for both student and
the teacher since they do not have to visit to the respective institutions.
iii) Online Books Sharing Platforms: Another effective and important approach of
social technology is the sharing of online books (Park et al., 2013). Several individuals can
easily share their books online with other readers with the help of a distinctive platform. This
type of platform helps the user to share his or her book even on rent and gaining cost
effectiveness. Moreover, the person, who has taken the books also gets benefits as he or she
does not have to buy that particular book and is getting it online. One of such popular and
important platform is Glose. It is a reading application, which allows several users to gain
and provide access to these electronic books (Mackey & Jacobson, 2011). It is extremely user
friendly and could be used by every individual after downloading it. This particular approach
helps to pertain the digital literacy to higher extent and without any complexity.
Conclusion
Therefore, from the above discussion, it can be concluded that digital literacy does not
replaces the traditional forms of literacy and not on building on the skills, which could
eventually form the proper foundation of the traditional forms of literacy. It normally
overlaps computer literacy since most of the technologies of digital media need some of the
computer competency levels. The above literature review has clearly outlined the entire
concept of digital literacy with relevant details. The several advantages, disadvantages are
also described in this report to understand the scenario. Moreover, several socio technical
approaches of digital literacy are also provided with proper description.

9
DIGITAL LITERACY
References
Blikstad-Balas, M. (2015). Digital literacy in upper secondary school–what do students use
their laptops for during teacher instruction?. Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy, 10
(Jubileumsnummer), 122-137.
Colwell, J., Hunt-Barron, S., & Reinking, D. (2013). Obstacles to developing digital literacy
on the Internet in middle school science instruction. Journal of Literacy
Research, 45(3), 295-324.
Goodfellow, R., & Lea, M. R. (Eds.). (2013). Literacy in the digital university: Critical
perspectives on learning, scholarship and technology. Routledge.
Greene, J. A., Seung, B. Y., & Copeland, D. Z. (2014). Measuring critical components of
digital literacy and their relationships with learning. Computers & Education, 76, 55-
69.
Hartley, J. (2017). Uses of YouTube Digital Literacy and the Growth of Knowledge. In The
Uses of Digital Literacy (pp. 110-131). Routledge.
Hinrichsen, J., & Coombs, A. (2014). The five resources of critical digital literacy: a
framework for curriculum integration. Research in Learning Technology, 21.
Mackey, T.P. & Jacobson, T.E. (2011). Reframing information literacy as a metaliteracy.
College & Research Libraries, 72(1), pp. 62-78.
Meyers, E. M., Erickson, I., & Small, R. V. (2013). Digital literacy and informal learning
environments: an introduction. Learning, media and technology, 38(4), 355-367.
Mohammadyari, S., & Singh, H. (2015). Understanding the effect of e-learning on individual
performance: The role of digital literacy. Computers & Education, 82, 11-25.

10
DIGITAL LITERACY
Murray, M. C., & Pérez, J. (2014). Unraveling the digital literacy paradox: How higher
education fails at the fourth literacy. Issues in Informing Science and Information
Technology, 11, 85.
Pangrazio, L. (2016). Reconceptualising critical digital literacy. Discourse: Studies in the
cultural politics of education, 37(2), 163-174.
Park, Y. J. (2013). Digital literacy and privacy behavior online. Communication
Research, 40(2), 215-236.
Pinto, M., Cordon, J. A., & Diaz, R.G. (2010). Thirty Years of Information Literacy (1977-
2007): A Terminological, Conceptual and Statistical Analysis. Journal of
Librarianship and Information Science, 42 (1), 3-19.
Tan, E. (2013). Informal learning on YouTube: Exploring digital literacy in independent
online learning. Learning, Media and Technology, 38(4), 463-477.
Thompson, K. M., Jaeger, P. T., Taylor, N. G., Subramaniam, M., & Bertot, J. C.
(2014). Digital literacy and digital inclusion: Information policy and the public
library. Rowman & Littlefield.
Voogt, J., Erstad, O., Dede, C., & Mishra, P. (2013). Challenges to learning and schooling in
the digital networked world of the 21st century. Journal of computer assisted
learning, 29(5), 403-413.