Before entering fully into the meaning of the term digital native, we are going to proceed to know the etymological origin of the two words that give it shape:
-Native, first, comes from Latin, exactly from “nativus”. This word can be translated as “born” and is formed from the union of these lexical components: the word “natus”, which can be translated as “born”, and the suffix “-ivo”, which is used to indicate “ active or passive relationship.
-Digital, secondly, also emanates from Latin. In its case it derives from “digitalis”, which means “relative to the finger”. More precisely, we can establish that it was formed from these lexical components: the noun “digitus”, which can be translated as “finger”, and the suffix “-al”, which means “relative to”.
The adjective native can be used to refer to someone who was born in a certain place or to what is innate to a certain nature. Digital , meanwhile, is the system or machine that produces, stores, transmits or displays information through the combination of bits.
The individual whose birth occurred when digital technologies were already present in daily life is known as a digital native , therefore. Digital natives are generally referred to as people born since the late 1970s or early 1980s , although it can also be limited to those born after 1995 (when the Internet became widespread).
A digital native grows up surrounded by digital resources. That is why you learn to use devices of this type intuitively and naturally, since they are part of your reality from the beginning of your own life. On the other hand, the so-called digital immigrants (people born before the beginning of the digital age) have to train to use these tools and must get used to them.
This is because those who were born in the '50s or '60s , for example, did not know in their childhood, adolescence or youth many products and services that are almost essential today, such as the Internet or cellular (mobile) telephony. That is why they had to adapt to a “new world” . Digital natives, on the other hand, were already born in this technological context.
As for the notion of digital native, it is attributed to the American author Marc Prensky , who used it in an essay published in 2011 . For Prensky , digital natives are adapted to technological advances, they choose graphics instead of texts, they seek to access information immediately and carry out multiple tasks simultaneously.
Other characteristics that identify the digital native are the following:
-They have multitasking capacity. What this means is that they can perform several tasks at the same time. And not only that but carry them out effectively to achieve optimal results.
-In the same way, it must be indicated that these are people who are capable of making decisions quickly. Thus, they not only quickly analyze a decision but also take the solution that they consider most appropriate.
Precisely for all this, there are many companies that when hiring workers opt for them to be digital natives. And they consider that all these peculiarities make them really useful and productive employees.