Social Networking and Teens

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Are you or your friends addicted to social networking? Does social networking affect you and your friends? 

A survey by SciJourner of 51 youth, ages 21 and under, finds that nearly a third say they are “addicted” to social networking, but only 8% of the teens and young adults surveyed feel that social networking affects their relationships with other people. The survey also showed that younger teens, ages 14 and 15, use the social networks Facebook and Bebo more than teens at the age of 17.

The survey was conducted by handing out questionnaires to Youth Exploring Science teens at the Saint Louis Science Center and to youth in the community, or posting as a wall on Facebook and Bebo.

Approximately equal number of males and female took the survey. Of those who responded, 37% are under 16. Most of the teens used Facebook, but 30% preferred Bebo and 20% were on both Bebo and Facebook.

How much time are teens spending on social networks? For this survey we defined addicted as checking their Facebook or Bebo page more than 3 times a day. Around a third of the 51 teens fell into that category, spending 30 minutes to 5 hours per day on social networking.

One interesting aspect of social networks is that they have a 

Teens can be
spot where you can put if you are in a relationship—married, single etc. Teens in a really good relationship will say that they are “married”. “Complicated” means that you might be in a relationship, but it is not working that well.

Around 57% of the teens reported that they were in some kind of relationship. Why do so many of the teen’s relationship statuses say something other than single?

“Being married does not have anything to do with how many friends I have; I just network,” says Maurice M. Jr., age16. “If a girl wanted to add me that was attractive then I would add her, but that did not mean I have chat with her.” Does he fight with his “wife” on Facebook? “No. What my wife and I have going on it not for the public to know about,” says Maurice.

Do teens whose status is single look for relationships on social networks? Says Mark C., age 17, “No, I’m not really into that vibe, I want to find someone who I can ‘kick it’. I don’t want some random person on the Internet.” But he adds, “Sometimes, to my close friends, I do vent about being single on the computer, but not for the public to see.” Mark adds “Just because my status says single does not affect the amount of friends I have. “ 

“The only reason my relationship status is complicated is because one minute my boyfriend and I are arguing and the next we are happy,” states Niklya M., age 17. “When I put complicated I started to get a nice amount of boys that tried to add me, it was wired. But when we were in a relationship, I didn’t have that much friend requests.” She says that “This is not a permanent status, but for now I need [my boyfriend] to understand that we don’t have to be together.” 

Most of the people surveyed say that social networks do not affect their relationships because they do not allow it. Others feel that because it’s a social network things are going to happen. 

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26 COMMENTS

  1. wow. i never knew that your relationship status actually influences that amount of friend requests you get on facebook. Then, again im not on it enough to tell anyway. Great article, it was very informitive :smile

  2. I definately agree with what this article has to say. It doesn’t surprise me much that so many people are addicted to Facebook. I also found the part that talked about relationships very interesting and I never really thought about that.

  3. I thought this was an interesting topic because it directly involves me since I have a facebook account. The statistics were interesting. It never occured to me that your relationship status might effect the amount of friend requests you have. Good article! 🙂

  4. :smile I thought that this was really true. My relationship status on facebook is with a girl, but she’s my friend. That makes my page more open for boys to add me, but if i said in a relationship, they wouldn’t add me. This was very informative. Good job.

  5. I actually really liked this article. Its definately really relateable to me because I have a Facebook, and I mighttt fall in the category of people who are "addicted" to it, I’m on it all the time, right now actually..i also didnt know that the relationship status affected how many friend requests you get, but that makes alot of sense now that I think about it. Good article 🙂

  6. I really liked this article because everything in it is so true. I see it happening all the time because I have a Facebook account and so many people are on it all the time. I could see how the relationship part would affect your friend request but it does not affect me too much. Overall I found this article very interesting and I really liked it.

  7. I really liked reading this article because I could relate to it, because I have a facebook and am on it a lot. I agree that a lot of people are addicted to it, but I am a little iffy on that the realtionship status part could affect your friend requests. I don’t think that is always true because I think people just add,because sometimes at frist you can’t even see their realtionship status at first and how do you know that maybe they are just in a joking realtionship? Either way, this article was very good, and i liked reading it!

  8. I really liked this article. It’s interesting because I have an account on Facebook and I never really thought about what people thought whenever they saw my relationship status. After reading it, it does make sense that less people of the opposite sex would add you as a friend if you were in a relationship, even if they were unaware if it was a real relationship or not.

  9. I thought this article was really interesting and I never would have thought that my relationship status on Facebook would affect how many friend requests I get. I agree with everything this article says and it was a great article.

  10. It was a realli nice article………….
    Evn i m adicted to FB……
    It is a realli nice attempt frm ua syd…..Thnxxxxxxxx alot….

  12. I didn’t ever think about how much my relationship status would change the way my guy friends acted on facebook, or how many more people would add me. This iarticle turns out to be completely true.

  13. This article is interesting because I have a facebook, but I’ve never noticed that a relationship status could change the amount of friend requests you get.

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