Have America’s teenagers begun losing interest in Facebook?
A new report says the answer is in the affirmative, and marketers may want to take note. A freshly published Pew survey indicates that the social network of one billion is becoming too much of a headache for some teens to handle.
Why so? Because their moms, dads, grandparents, neighbors, teachers, and extended family are all there on Facebook too.
Teens are increasingly turned off to Facebook for this reason. They also complain about their friends’ over-sharing and about too much ‘drama’ on the site.
As a result, they are increasingly flocking to other social platforms, such as Twitter.
These are some of the findings of a new Pew Research Center survey of U.S. teens’ social media use. Released Tuesday, the survey finds that teens are sharing more personal information on social media, but are also taking a variety of steps to manage their privacy online.
“The stress of needing to manage their reputation on Facebook also contributes to the lack of enthusiasm,” the survey said, noting that 24% of online teens now use Twitter, which is up from 16% in 2011.
“Those teens who used sites like Twitter and Instagram reported feeling like they could better express themselves on these platforms, where they felt freed from the social expectations and constraints of Facebook,” Pew reports.
“Nevertheless, the site is still where a large amount of socializing takes place, and teens feel they need to stay on Facebook in order to not miss out.”
Although Twitter is rapidly gaining steam, Facebook is still the most popular social network among U.S. teens… for now.