Mobile Messaging Gone Wild

Findings from Stamats’ SPRING TeensTALK® study are being double-checked and proofed as you read this, and I’m excited to share them with you on my next blog post. Until then, here’s a brief collection of unnerving teen-focused research you can use to impress friends, colleagues and family members…

Our friends at The Nielsen Company reported that during the first quarter of this year, teenagers sent and received an average of nearly 3,000 SMS messages each month. That’s about 100 text messages each day, just more than six text messages every waking hour… about one every 10 minutes.

Last week, the good folks at the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project reported on some research they completed in September. Their most recent teen-focused study revealed 26% of American teens with drivers licenses admit to having texted friends while they were steering 3,000 pounds of car down the road. Nearly half (48%) of all teens ages 12–17 say they’ve been a passenger in a car while a driver has texted behind the wheel.

If you spend any time at all with teens, you’re probably (justifiably) suspicious of these data. The numbers seem pretty modest to me. Teens all but live in SMS-ville, apparently making the concept of “defensive driving” more important than ever.

Teens’ younger siblings aren’t far behind in terms of their technical savvy. The 16 million kids (ages 2–11) online today represent nearly 10% of the active online universe, according to Nielsen. Five years ago, this age group spent seven hours online per month. In 2009, that number is 11 hours a month. Time spent online among kids has soared by 63% over the past five years, while overall time spent across all age groups is up just 36%, according to Nielsen.

The takeaway here is less an epiphany than a concrete reminder: one of our primary target audiences has redefined what it means to communicate by simply adding important new channels to the mix. And not only are the channels new and still a little foreign to some of us, the rules of engagement within those channels seem to be in constant motion.

Stamats’ advice:  If you’re older than 21, keep your eyes on this kind of research so you can keep your finger on the pulse of a communication playing field that shifts more quickly than we’ve witnessed in human history.

What’s your school’s position on incorporating SMS/text messaging into your communication protocol for prospective undergrads? Necessity, distraction, or somewhere in between? If you’ve chosen to integrate SMS into your communication funnel, what have you decided are appropriate uses and goals?

Photo by C y r i  l l i c u s