A new index shows how U.S. teenagers use technology and communicate with their peers.<\/p>\n
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\u201cKids these days, all they do is text\u201d\u2026 Although this quote is not completely true, U.S. teens are reshaping the forms of communication.<\/span><\/p>\n Back in 2012, Common Sense Media, a non-profit specializing in kids\u2019 technology and media use, conducted a survey asking U.S. teens about their favorite way to communicate with friends. Results showed teens preferred communication \u201cin person\u201d, but six years later, communication seems to have lost its \u201cface\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n The new report from Common Sense Media shows texting is now the favorite form of communication among teenagers in the United States with 35% of preference (33% in 2012), while in-person communication reached a 32% penetration (49% in 2012).<\/span><\/p>\n Social media came third in preferred form of communication with a 16% reach (7% in 2012).<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> Snapchat is like the high school kids with lots of problems, but with tons of popularity.<\/p>\n Although its stock recovered after hitting an all-time low in mid-May of 2018, a much-vaunted redesign of the social media app has failed to boost stagnant user growth and investors are worried.<\/p>\n According to the latest edition of PiperJaffray\u2019s bi-annual \u201cTaking Stock With Teens<\/a>\u201d survey, 46% of the 8,600 teenagers polled named Snapchat their favorite social media platform, while 32% of the respondents picked Instagram as their platform of choice.<\/p>\n Back in 2013, Facebook was the preferred social network of U.S. teens, in 2014, Instagram took over for a while, but it was replaced by\u00a0Snapchat\u00a0<\/a>in 2016, who has dominated the scene up to the fall of 2018, despite Instagram surpassed Snapchat for the first time in terms of usage, with 85% of U.S. teenagers using it at least once a month compared to 84% for Snapchat.<\/p>\n Common Sense Media<\/a>\u00a0also confirmed social media usage among teenagers has drastically increased between 2012 and 2018.<\/p>\n A survey conducted in the U.S. earlier this year showed that 70% of teenagers (13-17) check social media several times a day, up from just 34% in 2012.<\/p>\n<\/div> 35% of the 1,000+ 13- to 17-year-olds surveyed in 2018 stated that texting was their favorite way of communicating with friends. Back in 2012, preference reached 33%.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div> 32% of respondents still prefer in-person contact over virtual communication.\u00a0In 2012, 49% preferred in-person communication, showing a steady drop in the percentage of teens choosing personal interaction with their friends over electronic ways of communicating. Many parents view this trend anxiously.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div> Social media grew as a form of communication among U.S. teenagers. It marked a 16% of preference compared to 7% in 2012. Social media includes Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div> Video-chatting is also growing as a form of communication among U.S. teens, as just Facebook\u00a0logged<\/a> a total of 17 billion video calls in 2017, double from what they had gathered one year prior. Whatsapp announced 1.2 billion users are spending more than 340 million minutes a day making more than 55 million video calls.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>Social media use and preference<\/b><\/h3>\n
Texting<\/h2><\/div>
In-person<\/h2><\/div>
Social media<\/h2><\/div>
Video-chatting<\/h2><\/div>
Talking on the phone<\/h2><\/div>