Friday, March 29

Study on adolescents and social networks: Youtube reigns, Facebook plummets | Digital Trends Spanish


A huge annual study releases the PewResearch in the United States to analyze digital consumption trends among adolescents aged 13 to 17. And the numbers are eloquent, Youtube reigns with 95% online time, with TikTok rising to second place with 67% and Facebook falling precipitously with 32%.

This survey asked if American teens use 10 specific online platforms: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, WhatsApp, Reddit, and Tumblr.

YouTube stands out as the most common online platform teens use outside of measured platforms, with 95% saying they ever use this site or app. Majorities also say they use TikTok (67%), Instagram (62%) and Snapchat (59%).

The proportion of teenagers who use Facebook has dropped dramatically in the last decade. Today, 32% of teens report they have ever used Facebook, down 39 points from 2014-15, when 71% said they have ever used the platform.

Other social media platforms have also seen declines in use among teens since 2014-15. Some 23% of teens now say they ever use Twitter, up from 33% in 2014-15. Tumblr has seen a similar decline. While 14% of teens in 2014-15 reported using Tumblr, only 5% of teens today say they use Tumblr.

Teens’ use of certain online platforms also differs by race and ethnicity. Black and Hispanic teens are more likely than white teens to say they ever use TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, or WhatsApp. Black teens also stand out as more likely to use TikTok compared to Hispanic teens, while Hispanic teens are more likely than their peers to use WhatsApp.

Older teens are more likely than younger teens to say they use every online platform they are asked about except YouTube and WhatsApp. Instagram is a particularly notable example, with the majority of 15-17 year olds (73%) saying they ever use Instagram, compared to 45% of 13-14 year olds saying the same (a gap of 28 points).

Even as Facebook loses its dominance in the social media world with this new cohort of teens, higher proportions of those living in low- and middle-income households gravitate toward Facebook than their peers living in wealthier households: 44% of teens living in households earning less than $30,000 a year and 39% of teens in households earning $30,000 to less than $75,000 a year say they ever use Facebook, while 27% of those from households earning $75,000 or more a year say the same.

When reflecting on the amount of time they spend on social media in general, the majority of American teens (55%) say they spend about the right amount of time on these apps and sites, while about a third of teens (36%) say they spend too much time on social media. Only 8% of teens think they spend very little time on these platforms.

Beyond online platforms, the new survey finds that the vast majority of teens have access to digital devices, such as smartphones (95%), desktop or laptop computers (90%) and game consoles (80%). And the study shows that there has been an increase in daily Internet users among teenagers, from 92% in 2014-15 to 97% today. Additionally, the proportion of teens who say they are almost constantly online has roughly doubled since 2014-15 (46% now and 24% then).

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