Page 417 - Special Topic Session (STS) - Volume 4

STS2320 Bruno André R. C. et al.
Calculation of composite indices
First, we standardized the number of mentions by dividing them by the
number of Internet users, which we derived from the data included in Table 2,
to calculate the mention density.

= ∗ 1.000.000

In a similar vein, to be able to compare different levels of engagement, we
standardized engagement by dividing total engagement with the number of
mentions for each country to compute the engagement density.

=

Based on the above, we calculated each composite index as follows:

1+2
Composite Index =
2
where V1 is the normalised value of mention density and V2 is the normalised
value of engagement density, respectively. The formula to calculate the
normalized values of mention density and engagement density is a standard
min-max normalization that is commonly used in calculating composite
indices:
− .
= ∗ 100
− .

3. Results
The Global Technology Readiness Index (GTRI) and the Future Skills
Readiness Index are both appropriate indicators for the comparison of future
readiness across countries. Figure 1 illustrates the scores on both indices.
The analysis of GTRI scores, aggregated over the period of observation
for each of the 20 countries of interest, shows clear differences in the
prominence of emerging technologies in the public debate. The scores are
mainly concentrated in Singapore, the United States and the United
Kingdom. Arab countries are the ones with the most distance to cover in
terms of raising awareness and having experts/practitioners engage in
discussion with the rest of the Internet using population. Tanzania is the least
well-performing country in our sample. The analysis of the Future Skills
Readiness Index scores across countries shows a significant concentration of
scores in three countries: Turkey, Chile and Finland. A more in-depth analysis
of online activity reveals that a public debate on the teacher deficit drives the
observed mentions upwards for Turkey, and to a lesser extent for Finland.

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