Digital Social Capital and Well-being of Digital Citizens

Abstract

The central tenet of social capital theory is that social connections are valuable assets. It is also known that one’s social capital is very much related to his/her socioeconomic status. The access and use of the resources embedded in students’ social relationships are critical to students’ development. In comparison with adults in working environments, the social assets possessed by students primarily reside with their family members, peers and teachers. This constrains the development and maintenance of students’ social capital to those of their parents. With digital technologies, and in particular the Internet and social media, students have the possibility of extending their social capital beyond their offline social circles. In theory, students can leverage this new form of social capital enabled by online environments (digital social capital) to develop their social resources proactively beyond the accumulative resources shared through their family and school networks. Some critical questions relevant to this new form of social capital need to be investigated: 1) How do we measure digital social capital? 2) What are the factors affecting the development of students’ digital social capital, and do these factors change with age? 3) What is the effect of students’ digital social capital on their academic and socio-emotional development as well as sociopolitical participation? By referencing papers in this symposium, we illustrate how this line of research can make a significant impact on the theoretical development of social capital in the educational context as well as policy making to address digital divide and educational equity issues.