Most Americans Are Still Technophobic

Half Of Americans See Internet As Media Hype

When Will Everyone Be Online?

You hear it everywhere, e-mail is taking over. Everyone is doing business online. MWT came across three studies that indicate "Internet Fever" has not permeated every sector and that there is resistance to technological change even among the most highly educated professionals, such as doctors. For online to be universally accepted, or at least capture the participation of most Americans, the roadblocks to the information highway in each market sector need to be understood. The findings of these studies provide some insights into how to reach certain markets.

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Most Americans Are Still Technophobic

Three out of five Americans are still stalled on the entrance ramp to the so-called "information highway," describing themselves as "resistant" or "hesitant" toward communication technologies, according to a recent study conducted by MCI.

The survey of 1,000 Americans gauged their use of, and attitudes toward, communication technologies, including the Internet, electronic-mail, paging services, and cellular telephones.

Michelle Weil, the psychologist who conducted the study said that "many adults formed their attitudes about technology more than a decade ago, when technology was difficult to use. Technophobes are unaware that technology has become easier to use, more affordable, and more relevant to everyday living."

Despite their technophobia, more than one-third, or 39 percent of current non-users questioned said they will be using one or more of these technologies by the year 2000, either for business purposes or to stay in touch with family and friends.

After using communications technology, only four percent in the study found themselves frustrated by cellular phones, 12 percent frustrated by pagers, four percent frustrated by e-mail, and five percent frustrated by the Internet.

To help technophobes make the leap from non-user to user, MCI One and Weil have developed a free brochure called "Techno-Therapy: A Guide to Overcoming Your Communication Fears, Phobias, and Frustrations."

The brochure, available by calling 1-800-779-0000 includes a number of guidelines by Weil to overcome technophobia, including: trying one new technology at a time; learning from someone you know; playing with products before you use them in a business setting; and looking for integrated services from one provider.

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Half Of Americans See Internet As Media Hype

Fifty-one percent of respondents to a recent survey conducted for The Merrill Lynch Forum agreed with the statement that "the Internet phenomenon is more of an example of ‘media hype’ than of a fundamental change in this society’s technology."

When respondents were asked to name the most important technological development of the past 20 years, the Internet tied with videocassette recorders for third place.

About one quarter of those surveyed were "technology experts." Fifty-one percent of all adults described the Internet as more hype than fundamental change, while 45 percent of technology experts saw it in that light. Thirty-eight percent of all respondents disagreed with that statement, while 54 percent of technology experts did not concur. The rest either refused to answer the question, or said they did not know.

Playing on the metaphor of the "information superhighway," the survey asked respondents to say if they were drivers, passengers, getting on the on-ramp, or not even on the road. Among all adults, 47 percent said they are not on the road, 15 percent picked the on-ramp, 19 percent considered themselves passengers and 15 percent drivers. Not surprisingly, more of the technology experts thought of themselves as being in the driver’s seat — 56 percent, in fact, with another 21 percent seeing themselves as passengers, 12 percent getting on the on-ramp, and only 10 percent not on the road.

Ten years from now, 55 percent of all adults surveyed expected their cars to be more important to them than their computers. However, 65 percent of technology experts said their computers will be more important.

Only five percent of all adults responding to the survey said they have used their credit cards to buy something over the Internet, and another 14 percent said they would. Seventy-eight percent said they would not. Yet 50 percent of the same group have made credit card purchases by phone, while five percent said they would do so and 45 percent said they would not. Even among technology experts, 44 percent said they would not make credit-card purchases online.

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Physicians’ Online Interest Low

Physicians lag behind consumers in valuing and using interactive communications and the Internet to access health information, according to findings from nationwide focus groups conducted by Find/SVP. The initial findings show physicians vehement in their reluctance to jump on the online bandwagon.

The focus groups are the first phase of The American Interactive Health-care Professionals Survey, a study which analyzes physicians’ and healthcare industry executives’ opinions and uses of interactive technologies.

Michael S. Brown, the study co-director, said, "Many physicians see technology as just another attempt by the outside world to insert itself between the patient and the doctor. This seems to stem from their general frustration, anger, and sometimes fear, about the changing healthcare environment in general."

Another finding was that, while physicians believe interactive technologies have the potential to solve some key problems, most don’t know how to use those technologies themselves and they don’t have time to learn or manage other staff to apply the solutions.

"When it comes to using new interactive technologies, physicians’ views on the Internet vary from ‘ambivalence’ to ‘active resistance,’" said Thomas E. Miller, vice president of the Emerging Technologies Research Group at Find/Svp, and study co-director. "On the one hand, they know interactive healthcare information can speed their communications with colleagues and their access to recent medical discoveries. Conversely, they’re very uncomfortable with consumers who walk into their offices with self-diagnoses pulled off the Internet."

The focus groups confirmed that physicians are concerned about the way the Internet makes all healthcare information sources appear equal, irrespective of quality or appropriateness.

Another finding in the focus groups was that physicians also lack confidence in the security of current systems. Most physicians in the focus groups favored some kind of universal patient information system in principle, but by far the majority opposed actually implementing such a system, believing that patient confidentiality could not be guaranteed.

According to Brown, the focus group findings contrast with the general public increasing use of online medical information. "In our survey of over 1,000 Internet users, about 50 percent or more of those surveyed have already looked up and retrieved electronic health and medical information, and another 30 percent have expressed interest in doing so. Remarkably, the Internet Health/Med application most desired by consumers was the ability to retrieve personal medical information from their own doctor’s offices," said Brown.

(Contacts: Kelly Seacrist, MCI, 703-415-6124; Andrew Sieg, Merrill Lynch Forum, 212-449-7545; Stuart Gibbel, Find/SVP, 212-807-2603)

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