Monday, April 2, 2012

Teen Texting

Post contributed by Wesley Mills -

  A survey done by Princeton Review Research Associates International polled a representative sample of around 800 teenagers, ages 12-17. One of the main goals of these polls and interviews was to get a good gauge on what percentage of teens were texting and using their mobile devices the most.
  According to the Pew Research Center in 2011, 77% of teens had a cell phone and older teens are more likely to have a cell phone, and smartphone at that, than younger ones. Education is also an important factor as teenagers whose parents have high school diplomas are more likely to have cell phones than ones who don’t. Along with education brings income, and those parents make more than $75,000 allow their child to have a 91% chance of owning a cell phone as opposed to parents who make less than $30,000 who only have a 62% chance.
  Amongst cell phones, smartphones are majorly owned by older teens and the “data suggests a cell phone ownership evolution by age.” Since smartphones are social media friendly, it would only make sense that the majority of smartphone users would be teenagers and those that do have them are using them for purposes such as Twitter and Facebook.As the Pew Research Center report summarized,
“As with adults, smartphone-owning teens are avid users of a number of social media applications—91% of teen smartphone owners use social networking sites, and 25% are Twitter users compared with 77% of teens without smartphones who use social network sites and 13% who use Twitter.”
Source - Teens, Smartphones & Texting,  report by Pew Internet & American Life Project
The full study report is available here

Edit track -  Added graphic (BJB) 


  1. The new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project estimated that the amount of texts sent and received by teenagers have increased the past few years,and show no signs of decreasing. Teens are sending and receiving 60 texts a day compared to 50 back in 2009. The most circulation is seen in older teens 14-17 who sent 60 a day to 100 two years later. The report also says that girls text an average of 100 per day, where boys send around 50. Also, 63% of teenagers say they text everyday, while only 39% say they make phone calls everyday or interact on social networks.

  2. In an article titled, “The socio-demographics of texting: An analysis of traffic data,” authors, Rich Ling and Troels Fibaek Bertel, further analyze the concept of ‘teen texting.’ The authors pose such questions as: who texts and to whom do they text? How much do different age groups text? How wide is the circle of texting partners for different age groups? And, to what degree are texting relationships characterized by age and gender homophily? Ling & Bertel found that texting is hugely popular among teens compared to other age groups (which was also revealed in Mills’ analysis). In addition, the authors found that the circle of texting partners for the average person is rather small. In fact, “about half of all text messages go to only five other persons” (p. 281). Lastly, the authors concluded that “there is pronounced homophily in terms of age and gender in texting relationships” (p.281). After answering these questions, the authors came to the conclusion that texting is an important part of teen culture as well as a vital element to constructing bounded solidarity.

    Ling, Rich, Troels Fibæk Bertel, and Pål Roe Sundsøy. "The Socio-Demographics Of Texting: An Analysis Of Traffic Data." New Media & Society 14.2 (2012): 281-298. Academic Search Premier. Web. 3 Apr. 2012.

  3. I can't believe that when parents make less than $30,000 a year that their teenagers still have a 62 percent chance of owning a cell phone. 30k a year is not a whole lot of money, especially in a family where is more than one child. I grew up in a family where we made less than that in a year, and there was barely enough money for groceries.

    Additionally, any time I hear about teenagers who have smart phones, I wonder if their parents are teaching them that the internet is forever. I'm not sure that teens have the maturity to know that not EVERYTHING needs to end up on Facebook, yet they have a phone that probably has a button specifically dedicated to Facebook. I mean, some college kids don't even have the good sense to leave some photos off of Facebook.

    1. OH absolutely, my cousins family hardly have any money and every few months he has a new phone, always better than the last. There are so many people these days who don't care about the issues at hand and focus more on their instant gratification. My favorite example of this in my home town. There is this couple, I don't know them but they live in a trailer, really rundown and well.....What one thinks of when it comes to the South (pardon me for that). But in their tiny driveway they have a Hummer. So it's not surprising to me that most kids have cell phones no matter what these days, people's eyes are always on the prize.

  4. One thing I noticed is that 77% of teens and older are more likely to have cell/smart phones than youths. This makes a lot of sense to me. With age comes responsibility and commitments. For example, school related assignments, due dates, work schedules, etc. are all things I expect to be emailed on a daily basis. I can't have my laptop at all times, but with a smart phone I can access email at just about any time of day.

  5. One statistic that I wish had been mentioned was how many of these teens have part time jobs and the percentage that have their phone and service payed for in full by their parents. My parents bought my first cell phone until I saved up enough money to buy a smart phone when I was around 18. The percentage might be so small that it isn't even a factor but it would be interesting.

    It is absolutely understandable that the older teens would be more likely to have smart phones because I feel like most of us receive our first cell phones for the main reason that as you get to be 15 and 16 years old, you start being away from home more often. Likewise, I understand that even 62% of teens with parents making less than 30k a year still have a cell phone. You can buy a cheap phone on a cheap contract and most of these teens were probably given a phone in the first place for the benefit of their parents keeping in contact when they are away from home. My first cell phone was when I was 14 and I couldn't even text on it. Not to mention, I probably wasn't responsible enough to walk around with a $500 phone.

  6. When I was an elementary education major, I worked at an after school program. There where kids at the program that were the first grade and had blackberries and already texting. I would always wonder, who are you texting when you are in the first grade? It just really blows my mind how, not just teens, but people in general are obsessed with their phones and texting. I will admit, I'm one of those people.

  7. Oh I know Brooke, isn't it astounding how things are different these days? Kids today sadly will never have what we had growing up, "when I was your age, if I wanted to talk to someone we had to call them....On the land line." I mean things have changed so much and so quickly that we've already become the grumpy grandparents. Kids today have so much trouble interacting with others because they can express their feelings better in a text or email. Both are such handy mediums but it really kind of reverts us back to less intelligent times as well. But I know what you mean, i'm in the same boat as you, a few years ago I couldn't care less about cell phones. Now all I do anymore is text I feel like, it's just so much easier than getting locked into a conversation. And as phones progressively become more high tech, we become more and more obsessed with them.

  8. What I find most interesting about cell phone usage is many people in college complain about how they didn't have cell phones anywhere near the age that kids have them now. I wonder if the age kids get cell phones will continue to get lower and lower. Meaning the same people that are complaining about kids getting phones sooner and sooner and losing social skills due to texting and internet are enabling society to become that way.

    The numbers presented in this article make perfect sense. Like someone said earlier, with greater age comes greater responsibility. It makes sense that a parent would start a child out on some dinky flip phone and then move them up through the ranks to a smart phone. Whether they are mature and ready for the social power that comes with a smart phone, plenty of youngsters are getting them.