The generation based concept of Digital Immigrant and Digital Native proposed by Marc Prensky has been challenged and replaced by White and Le Cornu’s Digital Visitor and Digital Resident framework.
Digital Visitors are described as those who use digital platforms with specific goals in mind, thus they use digital platforms only as tools to achieve their targets and finish their tasks without leaving much or any digital trace behind.
On the other end of the spectrum are Digital Residents, who view digital platforms as space to connect and interact with other people. They express their opinions, produce contents, have significant online identity and visibility as well as a sense of belonging to the online community.
(A map of my personal digital visitor vs digital resident)
Agustí Canals and Eva Ortoll explains that sometimes we are residents, other times we are visitors, or both residents and visitors at once, or more one than the other. This model shows that people’s online behaviour are not defined by age. Digital users move from Visitor to Resident mode within or across different platforms, based on the professional, social, or personal context that they are in.
Based on my personal experience, I strongly resonate with the statement above as I often act as a Visitor in some digital platforms and a Resident in another platform. However, looking at my digital map, it is clear that I lean more towards being a Digital Visitor since I generally access online platforms only to acquire informations that I need.
(A chart of my current level of digital literacy)
To sum up this post, the model of Visitor and Resident is beneficial in analysing one’s tendency and behaviour when engaging in digital platforms. It doesn’t classify an individual into a definite position but rather serves as a flexible spectrum in which one can move depends on their situation, preference and intention.
References :
Formatjé N.B (2016) ‘Digital visitor or digital resident, how do you browse?’ http://www.uoc.edu/portal/en/news/actualitat/2016/086-visitant-resident-digital.html (Accessed : November 9th 2017)
Srivatsan, N. (2016) ‘Digital Immigration: Are you Digital Native, Immigrant, Visitor or Resident?’ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/digital-immigration-you-native-immigrant-visitor-nagaraja-srivatsan (Accessed : November 9th 2017)
Living and Working on the Web 