“A new report by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project shows that the internet is not changing the fundamental socio-economic character of civic engagement in America. When it comes to online activities such as contributing money, contacting a government official or signing an online petition, the wealthy and well-educated continue to lead the way.”

This supports what danah boyd was saying in June about social stratification being reproduced online (for her purposes, on social networking sites) contrary to what we may think about new media as being the great equalizer.  The Pew report does note, however, that online civic engagement skews a little younger than offline engagement.  This is probably because teens are the ones busy carving out new social spaces online, so by the time they are 18 (the youngest age group contacted for Pew’s survey) they are accustomed to engaging this way.  (Also interesting to note – only people with landlines were contacted.  It explicitly states that no cell phones were used to gather data.  I wonder how this might throw off the sample, considering I haven’t had a landline in years and neither have many of my friends, all of which are particularly wired individuals, though Pew states based on previous reports that leaving out this sample wouldn’t affect the study…)

Additionally, there’s a nice summary and discussion of the research over at ReadWriteWeb.

via The Internet and Civic Engagement | Pew Internet & American Life Project.