IAFOR Journal of Education: Technology in Education

Volume 8 – Issue 2 – 2020

Digital Skills at Divine Word University, Papua New Guinea
Iwona Kolodziejczyk
Divine Word University
Papua New Guinea
Philip Gibbs
Divine Word University
Papua New Guinea
Cecilia Nembou
Divine Word University
Papua New Guinea
Maria Rodina Sagrista
Divine Word University
Papua New Guinea

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Abstract
The purpose of the study was to investigate the level of digital skills within a group of
university students in Papua New Guinea and their ability to meaningfully engage within thedigital world. The study also aimed to explore whether the traditionally recognized digital
divide continues between genders and place of origin, and between years of study and faculties.
This study utilizes the framework defined by Van Deursen and Van Dijk who identify
operational, formal, information and strategic skills. The study measured the internet skills ofstudents by asking 289 participants to complete sixteen assignments on the internet. The results
indicate that, on average, the tasks were completed as follows: 38% of operational skills, 13%
of formal internet skills, 30% of information skills and 28% of strategic internet skills. Ageand gender were not significant; however, performances were significantly different for
students from the capital city as compared to those coming from a rural town or village
environment, and performance improved as students moved through the four years ofuniversity training. Differences in groups from specific faculties are significant but require
further study to explain. If operational and formal skills are a necessary (but not sufficient)condition for performance of higher-level information and strategic skills, then tertiary
institutions, particularly those facing the effects of the digital divide, will need to ensure thatthose necessary skills are provided for. Having ensured digital competency at that level, further
efforts can be made to develop information and strategic skills to ensure a meaningful andcreative use of digital technologies.
Keywords: digital skills, digital literacy framework, university, developing country, Papua
New Guinea

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The internet provides an endless source of information and entertainment, and also has thepotential to empower individuals to realize their educational and professional development.
However, just having access to Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) does notmean people are making use of them. Many people have access to these technologies, but theylack the skills to use them properly or the motivation to engage with them. Realising theimportance of the internet involves not simply monitoring the number of citizens subscribed to
an internet plan, but also assessing the patterns behind usage and skills such as production of
meaningful content, and engagement with technology or the benefits obtained from it (Fuchs& Horak, 2008; Godhe, 2019; Spante et al., 2018). Hence, digital skills are not simply
functional technological skills, but also the ability to find and select digital information, andthe knowledge essential for people to become “critical consumers” (Ameen & Gorman, 2009,
p. 99) of that information.
Research for this paper began as a study of the so-called “digital divide” whereby newtechnologies open a gap between those who can access these technologies and those who
cannot. Societal digital divides are those between citizens with and without formal education
and between rural and urban populations in their relation to technology. However, physicalaccess alone, without proper skills and adequate policies, is not enough to achieve the full
benefits of ICTs (Acilar, 2011; Chetty, Qigui, et al., 2018; Halford & Savage, 2010; Jin &Cheong, 2008). For this reason, nowadays many researchers expand the initial area of research,based on access and hardware, and introduce the so-called “second divide”, referring to thedifferent level of skills that allow users not only to access technology, but to make a fruitfuland effective use of it (Chetty, Qigui, et al., 2018; Lesame, 2013; Selvyn, 2004; van Deursen
et al., 2014).
The second divide, goes hand in hand with the term “digital literacy”, a new indispensable setof skills that allows users to take profit of and perform efficiently in digital environments(Eshet-Alkalai, 2004). It can be said that digital literacy is “as important as reading and writing
were in earlier centuries” (Katz, 2007, p. 4). In 2009, the ICT Development Index wasestablished with the intention that it become a tool to measure the level of ICT adoption andadvancement of a country and to contribute to adequate policy-making (Ayanso et al., 2011).
However, it has not been used uniformly and, for the purpose of our study, it does not provide
data for the country of Papua New Guinea. In order to start developing a base of reliable dataon the specific characteristics of the digital literacy in Papua New Guinea, our team decided toundertake a practical study to assess the digital skills of university students at the Madang
campus of Divine Word University.
Measuring Digital Skills
Given the importance of the digital skills for success in higher education as well as future
participation in the digitized world, substantial efforts have been made by researchers todevelop methods of measuring what has been termed “digital literacy”. Researchers approach
the issue from various perspectives. Reynolds (2016) observes that digital literacy often relates
to the extent of technology usage and thus measuring of digital literacy focuses on practicalskills. However, with the fast-changing technology, as well as with more exposure of the young
generation to technology and its practical application in everyday activities, measuring digitalskills has evolved in new directions to capture more complex functions and uses of technology.
The changing landscape of research done on digital skills is presented in Table 1, which gives
the example of four different approaches to measuring digital skills.

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Table 1: Four approaches to measuring digital skills
Four steps in digital
inclusions(Livingstone &Helsper, 2007, p. 10)

Six-skills of digital
literacy model(Eshet-Alkalai, 2004,2012)

Four types of digital
literacy skills (vanDeursen & van
Dijk, 2008, p. 4)

Digital competencies
framework (AlvarezFlores, et al., 2017, p.
545)

Information seeking:using the internet for
information finding
purposes

Photo-visual digitalskill: ability to use
graphical userinterface

Operational skills –the skills to operate
digital media

Games and emails:
using the internet for
information,entertainment andcommunication

Reproduction digitalskill – ability to use,
edit and manipulatedifferent forms of files
to produce new ones

Formal skills – theskills to handle thestructures of digital
media

Instant messaging anddownloading music:
using the internet forthe purposes describedin steps 1 and 2, andexpanding use forpeer-to-peer
engagement
Using the internet for
all previous steps
activities and for awide range ofinteractive and creativeuses.

Branching digital skill– ability to navigate
through hyperspace inboth non-orderly andnon-linear ways.

Information skills –the skills to locate
information in digital
media

Information –competency inbrowsing and filtering
data, evaluating andstoring data andfeedback
Communication –competency ininteraction and sharing
through digitaltechnologies,
participation andcollaboration throughdigital media andmanaging digital
identities
Content creation –competency indeveloping, integrating
and re-elaborating
digital content,
copyrights and licenses
and in programming

Information digitalskill – ability tocritically evaluate
online information

Strategic skills – theskills to employ the
information
contained in digital
media towards
personal (andprofessional)
development

Socio-emotional
digital skill - ability tocommunicate
effectively to createand share knowledge
onlineSafety – competency isprotecting devises anddata, protecting health,well-being andenvironment

Problem solving –competency in solving
technical problems,
creatively using digitaltechnologies andidentifying digitalcompetence needs

Real-time digital skill(added by Eshet in2012) – ability toeffectively execute
different tasks
simultaneously

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Although authors identified different stages in the process of engagement with technology,
they all point out the gradual evolution of the skills from the simple use of graphical userinterface and searching for information, to critical analysis of the information found, to more
complex tasks of using this information in order to create new digital artefacts and share themwith other online users.
While researching the digital divide among young people, Livingston and Helsper (2007)
identified four steps in digital inclusions which led them to categorizing young online users
into four categories: “basic users”, “moderate users”, “broad users” and “all-rounders” (p. 10).
These categories of users reflect a staged process of going online: from simple information
seeking (basic users), to using the internet for information, entertainment, and communication,
to expanding online activities to peer-to-peer engagement. The final stage includes a broad
variety of interactive and creative uses. The authors support the widespread assumption that“basic use makes for a narrow, unadventurous, even frustrating use of the internet, while moresophisticated use permits a broad-ranging and confident use of the internet that embraces newopportunities and meets individual and social goals” (p. 14).
Based on the notion that engagement with technology involves more than mere ability to use adigital device, Eshet-Alkalai (2004) proposes to evaluate digital skills through five-skills of adigital literacy model. To function effectively in the digital world, he observes, it requires a“variety of complex cognitive, motor, sociological, and emotional skills” (p. 93). Thus, heproposes a five-skills digital literacy framework, later (in 2012) extended into a six-skills
literacy framework. The proposed list of skills (photo-visual; reproduction; branching;
information; socio-emotional; and real-time) are claimed to be “survival skills” in a digitalized
world (Eshet-Alkalai, 2012, pp. 268–272) including in the context of today’s higher education(Komlayut & Srivatanakul, 2017).
In relation to measuring digital skills, Ilomäki, et al. (2016) observe that in policy related
papers, the term “skills” has been replaced by the term “competencies” (p. 655). Various papers
make an attempt to propose the digital competencies that are required from those who enterand function in the digital world (Gašová et al., 2018; Iordache et al., 2017). Included in Table
1 is a digital competencies framework developed by (Álvarez-Flores et al., 2017).
Van Deursen and Van Dijk (2008) observed that the models and framework available tomeasure digital skills were more on a conceptual level, which may contribute to a lack ofconsistency among researchers in their approaches to measuring digital skills. Thus, the authors
have made an attempt to move from the conceptual to the operational level. In their descriptionof the four types of digital skills they provided “operational definitions for operational, formal,
information and strategic skills, the measurements, and sample procedures” (p. 5). For each of
the type of skills, Van Deursen and Van Dijk provide measurement indicators. The first three
types of skills are related to an effective use of the internet. The indicators for operational skills
include skills in operating an internet browser, operating an online search engine andcompleting online forms. To measure formal skills, the indicators include skills in navigating
the internet through hyperlinks, and maintaining a sense of location while navigating theinternet. The information skills are measured by locating required information by choosing anappropriate search system, or website, ability to define search queries, selecting informationfrom search results, and evaluating information for accuracy of data and the reliability of thesources. The strategic skills are related to the purpose of the internet use and therefore involvethe skills to use the networks’ sources to achieve a specific goal as well as improve one’s status
in the society. To measure the strategic skills, the set indicators are: Taking advantage of the111

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internet by setting a particular goal, making the decision and taking the appropriate action toachieve the goal, and gaining the benefits belonging to this goal (pp. 5–9).
The framework used by Van Deursen and Van Dijk was to measure the internet skills of Dutch
citizens. The results show that although the Dutch population has a high level of operationaland formal internet skills, the level of information and strategic skills is much lower. The
authors concluded that surveys measuring only operational and formal skills may not reflect
actual digital skills of the researched population.
Our study adopted Van Deursen and Van Dijk’s framework. The main factors influencing ourselection of the framework were the specificity and detailed indicators developed for each of
the type of digital skills, and the practicality of the proposed research setup.
Digital Skills in the Papua New Guinea Context
For decades, the Papua New Guinea (PNG) Government has understood that command andcontrol of ICT is one of the keys to successful participation in the global digitalized world.
Thus, to ensure that the entire nation benefits from access to services provided through ICT,the government established a Department of Information and Communication in mid-1992.
Since then, although a number of policies and regulations were put in place, many attempts toimplement them were unsuccessful. Various barriers were identified, including the ad hoc wayof mounting projects resulting in incompatible systems being installed (Vaa, 2003), thediversity of the cultural and linguistic landscape, and the difficult geographical terrain (Henao,
2004). However, the government remains committed to strengthening the capacity andaccessibility of ICT across the entire country (Department of National Planning andMonitoring, 2010). In its vision, the government expects the higher education sector to be able
to prepare a skilful workforce prepared for the 21st-century work market. In line with the PNG
Development Strategic Plan 2010-2030, the Department of Education (2016) plans to provide
ICT training for all school teachers and for teaching ICT skills in primary and secondary
schools. The new curriculum for upper secondary schools (Department of Education, 2008)
introduces a Computer Studies program. In addition, the Department envisions establishingand maintaining successful e-learning infrastructure. However, despite ambitious plans, amajority of the student population, especially in rural areas, has no or little access to ICT(Department of Education, 2019; Leh & Kennedy, 2004; Ravinder, 2011; Trucano, 2014).
The higher education sector in PNG has a longer history of technology presence. Already in
1990, when there were only 250 internet users in the country, the internet was accessed at the
University of Technology in Lae (Kolodziejczyk, 2012). Since then, the application of ICT inhigher education institutions varied with generally much higher exposure to technology atuniversities than at colleges. However, as found by Kolodziejczyk, staff and students at all
institutions of higher education recognize technology as an important factor contributing tosuccess in teaching and learning as well as for a future professional career. In the same line,
the recent assessment of the PNG graduate labour market (Salonda et al., 2017) shows that
digital competency is recognized as one of the most important skills of university graduates.
Understanding the importance of digital skills for successful learning at the tertiary level (Gazi,
2016; Jiménez-Cortés et al., 2017; Komlayut & Srivatanakul, 2017) as well as the demand for
graduates equipped with digital skills (Chetty, Aneja, et al., 2018; Gašová et al., 2018; Ilomäki
et al., 2016), this research focuses on measuring the current digital skills of students at one of
the universities in PNG. Better understanding of the level of student digital competency may

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advise teaching and learning strategies towards strengthening and developing skills that will
prepare students to function in digitalized environments.
Research Design
The research was inspired by the study of Van Deursen and Van Dijk (2008) on internet skills
and the digital divide of the Dutch population. The objective was to investigate the level ofdigital skills within a group of university students in PNG and their ability to meaningfully
engage within the online world. The study also aimed to explore whether the traditionallyrecognized digital divide continues between genders and place of origin, and between years ofstudy and faculties. For these reasons, the study was guided by two main research questions:
Q1: What are the levels of operational, formal, information and strategic digital skills of
undergraduate students at the Madang Campus of Divine Word University?
Q2: Are there statistically significant differences among the categories of gender, age,faculty of study, year of study, and residency (capital city, town or village)?
For comparability reasons, our study employed a similar approach to Van Deursen and Van
Dijk and used the quantitative method. Prior to the completion of internet-based assignments,
the participants were required to fill in a short questionnaire which collected sociodemographic information such as gender, age, faculty, year of study, and former place ofresidence before joining the university. Residence was considered significant because PNG has
only one city, the capital Port Moresby, with a population approaching half a million. There
are provincial towns, varying in size. However, the majority of the population live in small
villages, many of which are isolated, without electricity or modern amenities.
The tasks to be completed on the internet were prepared following the description of four typesof digital skills as defined in the original study:••••

Operational skills – the skills to operate digital media
Formal skills – the skills to handle the structures of digital media
Information skills – the skills to locate information in digital media
Strategic skills – the skills to employ the information contained in digital media
towards personal (and professional) development (van Deursen & van Dijk, 2008, p.
4).

A total number of 16 assignments were devised to measure various digital skills. Time wasallocated to complete each of the assessments. It required a total of 88 minutes to complete alltasks. All activities done on the internet were screen recorded for coding and analysis using
Active Presenter software.
For the purpose of the study a special computer lab was set up with 30 brand new laptops withthe same setup to ensure that all students were given the same tools. All computers wereconnected to the university’s network. To complete their tasks, students could choose from thethree popular web browsers (Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer and Chrome). After each groupcompleted the session, temporary files, browser history, favourites, cookies, and computerstorage and passwords were deleted to ensure that the next group work was not affected byprevious participants’ actions.

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In line with the quantitative nature of the study, appropriate sampling was used. To achieve a
representative sample of the student population, the researchers randomly selected 12 groups
from among three faculties. For randomization, all group names were written on a piece of
paper and a lottery done in each of the faculties at different levels: year one, two, three, andfour. Two departments from within the Faculty of Business Studies and Informatics were
excluded from the selection process, Information Systems and Maths and Computing, as theirextensive experience with technology compared to others may have affected the results. All
selected groups were approached and invited to take part in the study. All were informed about
the voluntary nature of participation; a few students declined participation and left the lab
during a session. A total of 289 students took part in the study which is considered an adequate
number for a population of approximately 1400 to ensure valid results for quantitative analysis.1
More detailed socio-demographic information about participants is presented in Table 2.
Table 2: Socio-demographic profile of the study participants
GenderFaculty
Year of study

Place of origin

FemaleMale
Arts and Social Sciences
Business and Informatics
Health and Medical Sciences
First year
Second year
Third year
Fourth Year
Capital city
Town
Village159 (55%)
129 (45%)125 (43%)
66 (23%)
97 (34%)73 (25%)78 (27%)86 (30%)51 (18%)67 (23%)158 (55%)
63 (22%)The study obtained ethical clearance on April 4, 2017 from the Faculty of Arts and Social
Sciences Ethics Committee (ID# FASS/FS/3/2017).
Study results
As indicated earlier, the purpose of the study was twofold: to create a profile of digital skills
level among tertiary students and at the same time to explore possible digital divides along fivevariables: gender, age, faculty, year of study, and residency. After the general overview ofcompletion of tasks in each of the digital skills category, the following sections present moredetailed analysis of each of the four categories measured.
General Overview
Different types of digital skills were measured in four categories: Operational skills (9 tasks
completed); Formal skills (2 assignments); Information skills (3 assignments); and Strategic
skills (2 assignments). The completion of tasks was recorded as: 1 = not completed; 2= partiallycompleted; 3= completed. As expected, the highest percentage of task completion was in thelowest category – operational skills (38%). However, the most difficult for students to complete
were tasks in the formal skills category with only 13% of all tasks completed (Table 3).
1

We note the issues with the internet connection in the time students were involved in completing research tasks
and periodic unavailability of one of the government websites. In such cases, the affected results were notincluded in statistical analysis.

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Table 3: General summary of completion of tasks in four categories of digital skills
Completion of tasks
Operational tasks (9)Formal tasks (2)Information tasks (3)Strategic tasks (2)Mean (M)Standard
Deviation (SD)% of tasks completed

2.04
1.64
1.68
1.64

.814
.661
.816
.886

38
13
30
28

Operational Tasks
The results of a linear regression test indicate that faculty and year of study are the main
predictors of the level of operational skills.
Table 4: Linear regression of results of the number of operational tasks completed

GenderAge
Faculty
Year of study
Place of residency
R2
F

Beta
.087
-.088
.136
.386
-.075

Number of tasks completedt
1.562-1.5372.441
6.783-1.341.154
11.449

Sig.
.120
.126
.015
.000
.181
p<.001The ANOVA test2 shows that among three faculties, students from the Faculty of Medical
Sciences score highest in completion of operational tasks (F(2)=4.66, p=.01).
Table 5: ANOVA results for the operational skills category as completed by students in threefaculties

Arts and Social Sciences
Business and Informatics
Health and Medical
Sciences

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
3.33
2.74
37
3.10
2.87
34
4.22
2.18
47

When analysed by year of study, the ANOVA results (Table 6) show that students in the fourthyear score highest on completion of operational skills with the lowest results for students in thefirst year of study (F(3)=15.391, p<.001).

2

ANOVA test (or analysis of variance test) is used to decide whether the differences between means ofobservations is due to chance or whether there are systematic effects that have caused scores of observations in
one or more groups to be statistically significantly different.

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Table 6: ANOVA results for number of operational skills tasks completed by students at
different levels of university study

First Year
Second Year
Third Year
Fourth Year

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
2.34
2.40
26
2.96
2.69
33
4.52
2.27
50
4.67
2.45
52

Formal Skills
The results of linear regression test indicate that three main predictors of the level of formal
skills among participating students are year of study, place of residence and faculty.
Table 7: Linear regression of results of the number of formal tasks completed

GenderAge
Faculty
Year of study
Place ofresidency
R2
F

Number of tasks completed
Beta
t
-.038
-.663
-.080
-1.380-.163-2.861
.239
4.110
-.187
-3.275
.133
8.642

Sig.
.508
.169
.005
.000
.001

.000

The ANOVA test shows that among students at different years of study, students in the fourthyear score the highest in completion of formal skills (F(3)=7.905, p<.001). The significanceeffect is caused by the group of first year students whose results significantly differ from theother three groups (Table 8).
Table 8: ANOVA results for number of formal skills tasks completed by students at different
levels of university study

First Year
Second Year
Third Year
Fourth Year

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
.05
.23
2.5
.35
.53
17.5
.27
.45
13.5
.39
.49
19.5

The ANOVA test shows that among students who came from a different residential background(lived either in capital city, town or village prior to their study at university), students who
lived in the capital city score the highest in completion of formal skills (F(2)=8,614, p<.001).
The significance effect is caused by the group of students who lived in the village whose results
significantly differ from the other two groups (Table 9).

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Table 9: ANOVA results for number of formal skills tasks completed by students comingfrom different residential backgrounds

Capital city
Town
Village

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
.45
.530
22.5
.23
.436
11.5
.14
.353
7

The ANOVA test (Table 10) shows that among students in different faculties, students fromthe Faculty of Business and Informatics score significantly higher in completion of formal
skills that from other faculties (F(2)=14.038, p<.001). The significantly lower scores wererecorded among students in the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences.
Table 10: ANOVA results for number of formal skills tasks completed by students indifferent faculties
Number of tasks completed
M
SD
Arts and Social Sciences
Business and Informatics
Health and Medical Sciences

.26
.47
.10

.442
.561
.306

% of all
tasks
13
23.5
5.1

Information Skills
The results of linear regression test (Table 11) indicate that the two main predictors of the levelof information skills among participating students are year of study and place of residence.
Table 11: Linear regression of results of the number of information tasks completed

GenderAge
Faculty
Year of study
Place of residency
R2
F

Number of tasks completed
Beta
t
-.017
-.299
-.044
-.734
-.016
-.275
.182
3.036
-.193
-3.258
.075
4.564

Sig.
.765
.463
.783
.003
.001
.001

The ANOVA test (Table 12) shows that scores of information tasks completion differ
significantly (F(3)=4.727, p<.003) among students at different levels of study with students
from first year scoring significantly lower than other groups.

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Table 12: ANOVA results for number of information skills tasks completed by students at
different levels of university study
Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
.59
.683
19.7
.97
.772
32.3
1.0
.826
33.3
.98
.836
32.7

First Year
Second Year
Third Year
Fourth Year

The ANOVA test shows that among students who came from different residential backgrounds(lived either in the capital city, town, or village prior to their study at university), students who
lived in the capital city score the highest in completion of information skills (F(2)=7.277,
p<.001). This effect is caused by the group of students who lived in the village whose results
significantly differ from the other two groups (Table 13).
Table 13: ANOVA results for number of information skills tasks completed by students fromdifferent residential backgrounds

Capital city
Town
Village

1.0597.9430.5714

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks.7361035.3.8235731.3.6889519

Strategic Skills
The results of linear regression test (Table 14) indicate that faculty is the only predictor of thelevel of strategic skills among participating students.
Table 14: Linear regression of results of the number of strategic tasks completed

GenderAge
Faculty
Year of study
Place ofresidency
R2
F

Number of tasks completed
Beta
t
-.107
-1.814
-.042
-.687
-.135
-2.266
.069
1.135
-.109
-1.820
.057
3.404

Sig.
.071
.492
.024
.257
.070

.005

The ANOVA test (Table 15) shows that students in the Faculty of Business and Informatics
scored significantly higher in completion of strategic skills than from other faculties(F(2)=9.234, p<.001). This effect is caused by the group of students in the Faculty of Healthand Medical Sciences whose results significantly differ from the other two groups.

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Table 15: ANOVA results for number of strategic skills tasks completed by students indifferent faculties

Arts and Social Sciences
Business and Informatics
Health and Medical
Sciences

Number of tasks completedM
SD% of all tasks
.57
.639
28.5
.80
.706
40
.38
.509
19
Discussion

The study objective was twofold; firstly, to investigate the levels of operational, formal,
information and strategic digital skills of undergraduate students at the Divine Word University
in Madang Campus; secondly, to explore any statistically significant differences among thecategories of gender, age, faculty of study, year of study, and residency.
As mentioned earlier, the study used the framework from a previous research study in The
Netherlands (van Deursen & van Dijk, 2008). We note the completion rate in our PNG studyof tasks across all four categories, operational, formal, information and strategic is 39, 13, 29
and 28 percent as compared with 80, 72, 62, 22 percent respectively in The Netherlands study.
As reported, the highest percentage of completed tasks was in the lowest category – operational
skills (38%). In this category students were expected to navigate an internet browser, operate
an online search engine and complete an online form. Most of the students were able tocomplete successfully the two initial tasks while the latter task proved the most difficult with
only 3% completing it. Van Deursen and Van Dijk (2008) pointed to a positive correlation
between internet experience and operational skills. This may explain why students in PNG
found it difficult to complete tasks in this category. Comprehensive study of e-government
services in PNG conducted by Daniel (2020) concluded that the majority of the government
websites operate on an emerging level with only basic one-way communication available tothose who use their service; only one-third (about 34%) of the services provided were improved
one-way (e.g. forms for manual completion) and simple two-way communication (e.g. contact
forms and search facilities). Consequently, Daniel observed that the majority of citizens use
services at an emerging level. The demonstrated pattern of internet skills reflects Daniel’s
observation: students were able to navigate websites successfully but only few were able toengage in some form of communication with the service provider.
In the formal skills category, the students were expected to navigate through internet websites
by recognizing and using tabs and hyperlinks without getting disoriented and locating similar
information in different website layouts. Unexpectedly, students did not perform well with only
13% completion across all tasks in this category. The most difficult task involved identifying
physical addresses of four organizations in the capital city. It should be noted that there is no
postal service to physical addresses in PNG. This may help explain why only students from thecapital city, who knew the physical location of the organizations, were able to complete thetask. None of the students from a rural village background completed the task successfully
indicating that life experience could be a significant factor in their ability to complete the digital
task.

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The information skills category required students to choose appropriate websites to seek
information. One-third (30%) of students were able to complete all the tasks successfully. The
strategic skills category required students to define search queries and select proper resources.
Almost one-third (28%) of students completed successfully all tasks in this category. We notethat the results in these two categories were almost as high as in operational skills and muchhigher than in formal skills. The results in our study in these two categories show a different
trend from The Netherlands study where higher level of skills showed a lower level ofcompletion. The observed converse trend of successful completion of tasks in the two studies
indicates that long exposure to the internet as in The Netherlands, may well contribute to theoperational and formal skills but is insufficient for successful completion of information andstrategic skills. In PNG, where the exposure to the internet is much shorter, students in theuniversity setting were better able to complete tasks that require intellectual skills. Our
observation remains in line with other studies, which found that the time spent on the internet
has a weak relation with the level of internet skills and influences only operational and formal
skills (van Deursen et al., 2011) while educational level shows a relevant impact on the ability
to solve complex information and strategic tasks on the internet (Godhe, 2019; Gui & Argentin,
2011; Kim, 2019; Passey et al., 2018).
Considering the second objectives, whether there are statistically significant differences among
the categories of gender, age, faculty of study, year of study, and residency, in both places The
Netherlands and PNG there is no significant gender difference. Age did not feature in thesignificance tests for PNG, possibly because all the participants were between 18 and 29 yearsof age.
Considering the year of study, the results demonstrate that the year of study positively
correlates with successful completion of tasks in three categories (Tables 4, 7, and 11). It wasparticularly obvious with only 2% of year one students completing formal skills tasks.
Turning now to the two remaining categories of residency and faculty we note how the PNG
study distinguished between those who came from the capital city, Port Moresby, those whocame from provincial or rural towns, and those from rural villages. This appears to be asignificant predictor, at least for formal and informational skills. It follows that those from
more isolated environments will have less exposure to the digital world and be on the
disadvantaged side of the digital divide.
Similarly, of interest is the significance of Faculty as a predictor in three of four skills for the
PNG students. It may be expected that students in the Faculty of Business Studies andInformatics might have better developed digital skills, but this was apparent only in formal andstrategic skills (Tables 10 and 15). Further study may shed light on why Faculty of Health andMedical Sciences students should score so well in operational skills and so poorly on strategic
skills.
Conclusion
Digital literacy is important in education, particularly tertiary education. Duncan-Howell(2012) has researched the nature of the digital competency exhibited by undergraduate students
in an Australian University. She found that they had a high level of “digital comfort” but that
did not necessarily translate from consuming content to creating content. She concluded that
there is a strong need in higher education “for meaningful use of digital technologies as learning

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tools and the development of digital professional skills within programs that is beyond thecurrent practice of being limited to LMS use and email” (p. 838).
At a polytechnic tertiary institution in Singapore, students were found to be not well acquainted
with a range of information search strategies and techniques that would enable them to searcheffectively for information (Laxman, 2009). Laxman proposes school programs that would
enable students to become information literate and more able to fully utilize the educational
computing potential of the internet in developing vibrant, independent learning environments.
The four levels of digital literacy skills from Van Deursen and Van Dijk (2008), provide waysof refining our understanding of digital competency so that we can identify and focus on skills
that need attention. With only 38% of operational tasks and 13% of formal tasks completed in
the PNG study, we cannot conclude as in The Netherlands that such skills will be learned
simply by practice. Effects of the first digital divide mean that many first year students cometo university with limited practice and consequently face a steep learning curve.3 Our research
points to the need for training and formal schooling right from the first year of tertiary
education in PNG, since a good number of students will come with little prior experience.
Divine Word University meets a felt need by giving a laptop to every new fully registeredstudent and providing formal coursework in use of computers and the internet in their firstsemester at the university. The effect of such training may be seen in the relative improvement
between first and second years shown in Table 8. If, as Van Deursen and Van Dijk (2008)
conclude, that “operational and formal skills are a necessary (but not sufficient) condition for
performance of information and strategic skills” (p. 19), then tertiary institutions, particularly
those facing the effects of the digital divide, will need to ensure that those necessary skills areprovided for. Having ensured digital competency at that level, further efforts can be made to
develop information and strategic skills so as to make a meaningful and creative use of digitaltechnologies.

3

Since 2003, Divine Word University offers to all year one students a compulsory unit Introduction to EndUser-Computing and Word that introduces students to the concept of the internet and usage of WWW, issues in
end-user-computing, and basic and intermediate level skills in MS Word.

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Corresponding author: Iwona Kolodziejczyk
Contact email: ikolodziejczyk@dwu.ac.pg

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