So with social media just a way of life now, how is it effecting the teenage generation? My view, and probably the majority’s view, is that teens must spend more time texting and facebook’ing than they do talking these days. But according to new statistics this is not the case!
The study was done over 1,000 teens aged 13 – 17 who have been named the first generation of ‘digital natives’.
The report states that the overall feeling from these ‘natives’ is that although ‘technologies have helped them keep in touch with friends, get to know other students at their school better or connect with those who share a common interest,’ half of all respondents said ‘real-life communication is the most fun and fruitful for their relationships.’ I’d say this is definitely a promising result!
I was always worried that the younger generations would begin to lose the ability to communicate face to face. Possibly a tiny bit extreme, but could be the worst case scenario. So to see that natural human nature isn’t being taken over by technology is pretty promising. And with the report then going on to say that ‘36% of teens wanted to go back to a time when Facebook hadn’t been invented!’ – That’s just brilliant.
Text messaging remains the most common use of technology for teens with over two thirds saying that they text every day, and I am sure that this would apply to the majority of generations! I definitely text every day. Another interesting point in the report was that a number of teens felt that the use of Facebook made them feel more outgoing.
With quite a common view that social media is damaging the teens of the day, it is quite refreshing to see that this isn’t necessarily the case, and that in most cases it is actually enhancing teen’s lives.
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