A Tough Call: Impacts of Mobile Technology on Women's Employment

In developing countries, as many as 80 percent of women do not have access to the internet.

India has one of the widest sex-based digital divides with a gap of 15 percent for mobile phone ownership and 33 percent for mobile internet use.

Unequal access to information between men and women can cause underinvestment in children, poor use of health services, and limit the reach of state-sponsored social protection programs.

To narrow the divide, the Government of Indias Sanchar Kranti Yojana (SKY) program provided millions of free smartphones and data plans to female heads of household in Chhattisgarhone of Indias poorest statesin 2018.

The program paired distribution with messaging campaigns and guidance on how women could use mobile phones productively. Rigorous evidence on the effects of increasing womens access to technology is currently minimal.

With support from Development Innovation Ventures, a research team led by Yale University will evaluate the impacts of SKY to learn how mobile phone distribution affected women in terms of phone use and engagement; banking activity and income generation; access to information and networks; decision making and mobility; mental health; and social norms around the acceptability of women using mobile phones and how it affected communities in terms of economic activities, wages, and migration.

This evaluation will also investigate if and how the program changed peoples knowledge of current events and use of government services, whether they are more likely to use social media, and whether they are more likely to believe social media rumors and misinformation.

This research will generate critical evidence on the efficacy of programs designed to close the sex-based digital divide, and inform future research and policy design, including that of several programs that are already in planning stages by various state-level governments in India.