Teen Facebook Usage Declines, Pew Research Shows

Listen up credit union CEOs, your next generation of members —- teenagers — have replaced Facebook and Twitter with Snapchat, YouTube and Instagram as the social media platforms they use most often, according to new research released Thursday by the Pew Research Center in Washington, D.C.

Thirteen-to-17-year-olds, the youngest cohort of Generation Z, and their parents surveyed by Pew Research in March and April found that the top social media platform is YouTube used by 85% of teens, followed by Instagram (72%), Snapchat (69%), Facebook (51%) and Twitter (32%).

However, among the social media platforms teens  said they use most often are Snapchat (35%), YouTube (32%) Instagram (15%), Facebook (10%) and Twitter (3%), according to Pew Research.

Pew Research Associate Monica Anderson noted that the shift in teens’ social media use is just one example of how the technology landscape for young people has quickly evolved since Pew’s last survey of teens and technology in 2014-2015.

In that survey, 71% of teens said they were Facebook users, while 52% used Instagram and 41% on Snapchat.

“Most notably, smartphone ownership has become a nearly ubiquitous element of teen life: 95% of teens now report they have a smartphone or access to one,” Anderson said. “These mobile connections are in turn fueling more-persistent online activities: 45% of teens now say they are online on a near-constant basis.”

Although teens tend to use similar platforms regardless of their demographic characteristics, there are a few exceptions.

For example, lower-income teens are more likely to be on Facebook than those from higher-income households – a trend consistent with the previous Pew survey, Anderson noted.  Seven out of ten teens who live in households that earn less than $30,000 a year use Facebook, compared with 36% of teens whose family annual income amounts to $75,00 or more.

Additionally, there are some differences related to gender and to race and ethnicity when it comes to teens’ most-used sites.

Girls are more likely than boys to say Snapchat is the site they use most often (42% vs. 29%), while boys are more inclined than girls to identify YouTube as their go-to platform (39% vs. 25%), according to Pew Research. White teens (41%) are more likely than Hispanic (29%) or black (23%) teens to say Snapchat is the online platform they use most often, while black teens are more likely than whites to identify Facebook as their most used site (26% vs. 7%).

What is common among across the overwhelming majority of teenage boys and girls is that 90% say they play video games.

Pew’s research also found that teens hold mixed views on social media’s effect on people their age.

Thirty-one percent say social media mostly has a positive effect on their lives by connecting with friends and family, making it easier to find news and information, meeting others with the same interests and keeping entertained and upbeat.

Forty-five percent of teens said social media has neither a positive nor a negative effect on them, but 24% said social media had a mostly negative impact through bullying, rumors, lack of in-person contact, distractions and peer pressure.

The random survey included interviews with 1,058 parents who have teens age 13 to 17, and interviews with 743 teens. The margin of error is plus or minus 5% for the full sample of 743 teen respondents and 4.5% for the full sample of 1,058 parent respondents, Pew Research reported.