The relational digital divide: psychosocial dimensions of digital exclusion in disadvantaged neighbourhoods

Abstract

This article examines how residents of structurally marginalised neighbourhoods navigate everyday information and digitalised institutional communication. Drawing on fifty-two semi-structured interviews and an action-group discussion with women living in six disadvantaged neighbourhoods in the Czech Republic, the study uses reflexive thematic analysis to explore how information is interpreted, shared and emotionally managed in contexts of institutional mistrust. The findings show that the digital divide operates less as a technological gap than as a relational and affective phenomenon. Digital communication was often experienced as overwhelming, ambiguous or threatening. As a result, information was navigated collectively through relational infrastructures—neighbours, family members and trusted social workers—who helped contain anxiety and translate institutional messages. Social workers emerged as key actors in mediating the emotional burdens of digitalised welfare communication. The article argues for a psychosocial reconceptualisation of the digital divide and underscores the importance of relationship-based, emotionally attuned social work.

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