Few Croatians Considered Active Internet Users

By Michael Pastore

Nearly one-fourth of the Croatian population has never heard of the Internet, and 28 percent have heard of it but aren't really sure what it is, according to a study by IPSA.

IPSA also found that 12 percent of Croatians have used the Internet at least once in their life. Almost 6 percent of Croatians have used the Internet at least once in the last month, and are considered active Internet users. That is a 27 percent increase compared to February, when 4.4 percent of Croatians were active Internet users.

The study also found that from February until May the number of dial-up connection users increased 7.7 percent, and the number of lease-line users was up 16.1 percent.

The majority of Internet users in Croatia live in the most developed regions of the nation, specifically the capital, Zagreb, and the northern coast, Istria and Primorje. More than half (52 percent) of Internet users live in four large cities. Forty percent live in smaller towns, and 1 percent live in smaller settlements not far from big cities.

As expected, Croatian Internet users are more educated, wealthy, and are younger than the population in general. Half of the Internet users are younger than 26, one-third is between 26 and 35, and another fifth is between 36 and 55. Similar to European trends, IPSA found that men outnumber women 58-42 percent.

While only 12 percent of Croatian households have a PC, 60 percent of Croatian Internet users have PCs in their households.

The average Croatian Internet user spends 4.9 hours a week on the Internet. Users with Net access from home spend 6.7 hours a week online. The most common use for the Internet in Croatia is surfing without a specific goal, cited as one of the five most popular uses for the Net by 63 percent of those surveyed, followed by e-mail (53 percent), and reading news (48 percent).

The survey was conducted in February of 1999 among a random sample of 1,200 Croatians over age six. In May, the survey was done among a random sample of 1,100 citizens over 12.

August 19, 1999

Related item: An IriS survey of Internet users in 18 countries found that Internet penetration is now higher at home than at work in many of the world's most wired nations. Read Home Internet Access Pulls Ahead