Almost three quarters of internet users in the Middle East and North Africa region (70%) believe that online activity has disrupted normal social activity to the extent that today’s human relationships are now mostly ‘virtual’, according to a new study by Bayt.com in cooperation with research specialists YouGov Siraj. Exceeding the regional average by one percentage point, Saudi Arabia’s respondents believe that social activity is being sidelined by virtual contact, with just13% disagreeing.
Around the rest of the Middle East region, respondents mostly agree – to a greater or lesser extent – that being online is now the main form of social activity, most notably in Oman, Egypt and Bahrain where76%,74% and73% respectively of respondents agreed. Furthermore, the region’s respondents largely agreed that online forms of communication have replaced traditional forms: An overwhelming80% of those surveyed agreed that instant messaging and email, among other online methods, are now used instead of traditional forms of keeping in touch such as ‘snail mail’ and telephone conversations.
The Internet Usage study was conducted to gauge internet usage habits and attitudes among professionals and job seekers across the Middle East region.
“As we move into an increasingly digital and internet-savvy world, everyone in the region from business leaders to social workers to housewives – across generations – are embracing the internet whether for work, social or practical purposes,” said Amer Zureikat, Regional Manager at Bayt.com. “By conducting such a study, we can look at how people are using the internet and for what purpose, to give an indication as to where the region is in terms of internet maturity.”
The survey went on to ask respondents whether they feel the internet has helped with social networking, and how easy or difficult they think it is to find the information they need online. The majority of the region’s respondents,74%, agreed that the internet has been great for networking that would not otherwise be possible in the ‘real world’. The figures varied across the countries however, with an overwhelming80% of respondents in Bahrain hailing the internet’s advantages in terms of networking, closely followed by respondents in Oman (78%), Tunisia (77%) and Morocco (76%). Saudi Arabia matched the regional average with74% agreeing that the internet has empowered networking.
Attitudes regarding how easy it is to find data on the internet showed much more variation. At the regional level,53% of respondents agreed that it is difficult to find exactly what they are looking for on the internet, because of an information overload. This figure rose to68% of respondents in Algeria and63% of respondents in Morocco. Around the Gulf region, respondents largely varied as to how easy or difficult they find it to locate information online. Respondents in Qatar (43%) followed by respondents in Kuwait (48%) and the UAE (49%) faced some difficulties in finding required information, contrasted with53% of respondents in Saudi Arabia and59% in Bahrain. Overall, respondents in Lebanon had the least difficulty in locating the information they need; just40% of respondents said they encountered problems.
“Interestingly, when we asked the respondents to rate their own internet capabilities, those in Lebanon came out as the most competent, with40% considering themselves to be internet experts – the highest figure among the surveyed countries. The regional average showed that23% of respondents consider themselves to have an intermediate level of internet skills,49% said they are knowledgeable but need some help and24% consider themselves as experts,” stated Joanna Longworth, Chief Marketing Officer, YouGov Siraj.
Bahrain followed by the UAE (36% and31% respectively) also topped the table in terms of respondents who consider themselves to be internet experts. In KSA,25% of respondents consider themselves to be internet experts.
The survey went on to ask the respondents how much time, on average, they spend using the internet for work and leisure purposes. A significant proportion of respondents,49%, said they use the internet for work purposes up to two hours per day, with just a quarter of respondents using the internet for three to four hours per day. Interestingly,25% of the region’s respondents said they use the internet for more than five hours per day. When it came down to leisure use, the figure jumped up to67% of respondents in the region who use the internet up to two hours a day, but on the whole, respondents spent much shorter periods of time online for leisure than for work: Just14% said they use the internet for leisure purposes more than five hours per day.
Asked what they use the internet for, an overwhelming83% of the region’s respondents said they use it for emailing friends and another78% of all respondents said they use it for reading news, at least once a month. Other popular online activities according to the respondents were searching for jobs (77%), visiting social networking sites and listening to music (57% each).
“What we have also seen from the survey is that the internet is now a main source of information with the majority of respondents stating that it has overtaken traditional news mediums as the main source of political, business and lifestyle/leisure news,” noted Zureikat.
Across the region,87% of respondents said the internet has replaced print sources for political news to some extent. The UAE’s respondents matched the average as did respondents in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. In Oman, those that now rely on the internet for their political news was a phenomenal93%, followed by90% of Egypt’s respondents. In terms of business news,90% of the region’s respondents now use the internet as a main source to varying degrees, which crept up to91% of the region’s respondents who get their main lifestyle and leisure news online.
But despite using the internet for everything from news, to leisure and work, the region’s respondents generally do not feel comfortable making payments online for personal matters: Only45% said they were comfortable making an online transaction. This figure jumped to49% in Saudi Arabia of those comfortable to use the internet to pay, while respondents in Kuwait,60%, were the most comfortable with paying online for personal matters. By contrast, respondents in Syria, Egypt and Jordan were the most uncomfortable about making online payments, with69%,68% and67% respectively stating their discomfort.
The internet does have potential for online education according to the respondents. Almost two thirds of those surveyed across the region,65%, said they would consider taking courses online or would complete an online degree in the future. Respondents in Egypt and Oman were the most inclined to enrol for some sort of education online (76% and75% respectively), which contrasts with60% of respondents in the UAE, Kuwait and Bahrain, and59% of respondents in Lebanon – the least interested countries in online education. In Saudi Arabia, a significant68% of respondents said they would consider some form of education online in the future.
“The advantages that the internet presents to people all over the world are numerous, including increasing access to education and knowledge and enabling professionals across the globe to do their jobs even more proficiently,” commented Longworth.
“By conducting a study such as this, not only is it very interesting to see how and why people in the region use the internet, but it can act as an important source of data for organisations and authorities throughout the Middle East to see where any problems as to its use might lie, and then take steps to address them – in order to nurture an increasingly internet-savvy populace,” concluded Zureikat.
Data for the October/November2009 Internet Usage study was collected online between30th October and22nd November2009 with13,847 respondents from the UAE, KSA, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria and Pakistan. Males and females aged16 years and older, of all nationalities, were included in the study.