Tuesday, April 20, 2010
72% of US teens are daily texters: Study
Pew seems to be saying that girls 14-17 own the space: That "entire cohort" averages 100 messages a day (sending), compared to the third of all teen cellphone users. "The youngest teen boys are the most resistant to texting – averaging 20 messages per day," Pew found. As for texting vs. other forms of communication (we now need to make distinctions between purely communicating and entertainment or socializing, where digital devices are concerned): Though texting is No. 1 for communicating with peers, voice calls are No. 1 for doing so with their parents. Where social networking's concerned, Pew says 25% of all teens contact their friends daily via social network site, vs. 54% of all teens who do so via texting. For 15-year-olds, the preferred communication methods with friends fall in this order: texting (54%), talk face-to-face (42%), calling on a cellphone (41%), social network site (40%, and SNSs have features like IM and email), calling via landline (37%), instant messaging (33%), and email (12%).
And communication is obviously not the all of it. Pew reports that teens use cellphones to (good and neutral activities first): "Share stories and photos ... entertain themselves when they are bored (just like adults) ... micro-coordinate their schedules and face-to-face gatherings ... go online to browse, participate in social networks, and check their emails." Some also use cellphones to "cheat on tests and skirt rules at school and with their parents ... send sexts.... Others are sleeping with buzzing phones under their pillows, and some are using their phones to place calls and text while driving." There's so much more to this report, which draws on both a survey and focus groups (quantitative and qualitative information), including chapters on how parents and schools regulate cellphone use, attitudes toward cellphones, and the fact that 84% of teen cellphone users had slept with their phones on or right next to their beds. For some that's because it's their alarm clock, but staying in touch appears to be the biggest reason: "Teens who use their cell phones to text are 42% more likely to sleep with their phones than cell-owning teens who do not text," Pew says. Here's the Washington Post's coverage.
Labels: mobile technology, Pew Internet Project, teen communicators, texting
Friday, February 19, 2010
How much teens text: Latest data
Labels: mobile communications, social media research, teen communicators, texting
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Fresh look at teen cellphone use: Pew memo
As a parent, I thought for sure they were all texting more than talking, but maybe that's only recently (on pins and needles for the new Pew mobile study). [Nielsen Mobile did report last fall that Americans as a whole sent more text messages than made phone calls, starting the first quarter of 2007, according to a New York Times item I blogged about.] In Pew's 2008 numbers, 94% of teens had used their mobile phones to call friends and 76% have sent text messages, about 20% of them sending text messages daily.
But cellphones aren't teens' only social tool, of course. About a quarter (26%) of all teens "send messages (emails, instant messages, group messages) through social-networking sites," Pew says, "and 43% of teens who use social networks send messages daily. Similarly, another 26% of teens send and receive instant messages on a daily basis and 16% send email every day. And beyond social networking, "77% of teens own a game console like an Xbox or a PlayStation, 74% own an iPod or mp3 player," 60% use a desktop or laptop computer, and 55% own a handheld gaming device, Pew reports. [Meanwhile, moms haven't been left in the dusty - they're flocking to smartphones like iPhones and BlackBerries, CNET reports. Smartphones are the fastest-growing category of phones, and "about 14% of all wireless users who identified themselves as mothers said they owned a smartphone," up from 8.3% in the first quarter of 2008, CNET adds, citing Nielsen Mobile figures.]
Labels: cellphones, mobile phones, Pew/Internet, smartphones, teen communicators, texting talking
Friday, October 03, 2008
Teen uber-texters
Labels: cellphones, teen communicators, texting
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Silently advertising to teens
Labels: mobile advertising, teen communicators
Monday, August 04, 2008
P2P online-safety ed program
Labels: connected teens, online safety education, social networking, teen communicators
Friday, December 21, 2007
'Teens rule the Web'
Labels: media sharing, social networking, teen communicators
Sunday, September 09, 2007
CA may ban teen tech use in cars
Labels: driving laws, teen communicators
Thursday, August 23, 2007
'Old guys' on Facebook
Labels: parenting, teen communicators
Friday, July 20, 2007
How teens use tech
Labels: email, media sharing, social networking, teen communicators
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