Muslim Youth and Modern Technology: A Comparative Study

Abstract

This study represents an attempt at a comparative study of Turkish Muslim Youth and Muslim Youth across the world in terms of their engagement with the digital space. It forms part of a broader inquiry to delineate a global Muslim Youth profile as an associational encounter with modernization: understanding the perception and place of modernity in the lives of Muslim youth. The study employed a survey technique involving 15,832 Muslim youths aged 18-28 sampled across 22 majority Muslim countries. Out of this figure, 2000 youth constituted the sample pulled from Türkiye. Significantly, comparing the youth in Türkiye to those in other Muslim countries sampled, we observed that the average time spent by Turkish Muslim youths online is 1-2 hours less than the global average of Muslim youths sampled, which stood at 5 hours. Crucially, our findings do agree with the probability of a relationship between the time rate of utilization of the digital space and in behavioral and perceptional changes in the youth relative to their engagement with their offline space. We, however, concede that a lot more research is needed in this area to unearth the extent of this probability.