Teens' social media habits revealed by Pew Research

In the age of ever-present smartphones, the teenagers are going online now more than ever. In the latest data from the Pew Research Center, American teens' daily online habits were analyzed and patterns were found to emerge. Almost three-quarters of teens have access to a smartphone and 92% of teens reported going online daily. Facebook is the most popular social media platform for American teens as 71% of teens reported using it, followed by Instagram (51%) and Snapchat (41%). Most teens use a multitude of social media sites, but among those who stick to a single platform, Facebook still ranked the highest.

According to the survey, there is a gender-gap in social media platform preferences. Teenage girls tend to use visual-based platforms such as Instagram and Tumblr in a higher number than teen boys. Along the same gender-gap, boys have a higher tendency to play video games than girls.

Age played a role in online preferences as well as it was discovered that older teens prefer Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter while younger teens prefer Instagram as their most often used platform.

The Pew Research Center states that it usually collects its data by phone surveys, but this data was collected by an online survey, which they acknowledge may have an unknown effect on the survey results. The online survey was given to 1,066 American teenagers and their parents from a diversely representative sample.