UK 2008 Social Networking Survey
The Office of Communications in the U.K. has just published an 80-page social networking study that should be on your list to read. The study looks at social networking usage across age brackets and includes data on male/female as well. Bebo, Facebook and MySpace take the lead role when specific networks are discussed.
Here are some interesting and scary statistics published in the report:
- Despite the fact that the minimum age for most major social networking sites is usually 13 (14 on MySpace), 27% of 8-11 year olds who are aware of social networking sites say that they have a profile on a site.
- The average adult social networker has profiles on 1.6 sites, and most users check their profile at least every other day 41% of children aged 8-17 who had a visible profile had their profile set so that it was visible to anyone
- 25% of registered social networking users had posted sensitive personal data about themselves on their profiles (phone numbers, home addresses, etc.)
- The majority of adults who had used a social networking site had a profile on Facebook (62%) and this was the most mentioned main social networking site (49%). Nearly half of all respondents reported having a profile on MySpace and one-third had one on Bebo.
- Two-thirds of parents say they set rules about their child’s use of social networking sites, although only 53% of children said that their parents set such rules
For anyone with school age children this should be pretty scary stuff.
Posted: April 4th, 2008 under General.
Tags: children, internet, online, social_networks, uk
Comment from Matthew Botos
Time April 4, 2008 at 1:03 pm
It seems that Facebook has done quite well in its expansion beyond students!
The statistics around children, ages, and rule really underscore that the solution will require social engineering rather than technical. I don’t think being a parent has ever been easy; educating your kids about social networking will just make it a bit more challenging.