Pew Internet & American Life Project: Teens & Technology

The Pew Internet & American Life Project always has great reports in how people are using the Internet. Teens & Technology: Youth are leading the transition to a fully wired and mobile nation (PDF) is the latest report. Among the findings:

• Close to nine in ten teens are wired.


• Teens are technology rich and enveloped by a wired world.


• 45% of teens have cell phones and 33% are texting.


• Email is still a fixture in teens’ lives, but IM is preferred.


• Teens share more than words over IM.


• Half of families with teens have broadband.


• Face-to-face time still beats phone and screen time.


• Most teens use shared computers at home and growing numbers log on from libraries, school, and other locations.


• The size of the wired teen population surges at the seventh grade mark.


• Older girls are power communicators and information seekers.

The Project has an RSS feed available if you want to be alerted whenever a new report is published. The reports area a great indicator of what our patrons are looking for when they use our web sites and what kind of technologies they may be expecting to be available at the library. The feed is available at http://www.pewinternet.org/rss-reports.asp.

If you aren't using RSS yet, you can also be alerted to new reports through e-mail. More information is available at http://www.pewinternet.org/signup.asp.