Nearly half of teens say they are online ‘almost constantly’: Poll

Rebecca Klar
·2 min read
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Close to half of U.S. teens said they are using the internet “almost constantly,” according to a Pew Research Center poll released Monday.

Forty-six percent of teens said they are online almost constantly, on par with what Pew researchers found last year but nearly double the 24 percent who said they were online almost constantly in polls conducted between 2014 and 2015.

The increase comes as experts and lawmakers have warned about the impact of social media on youth mental health. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy released an advisory in May that argued social media use may be harmful to the mental health of young people, and Congress has been considering bipartisan proposals aimed at curbing social media harms for teens.

Black and Hispanic teens were more likely than white teens to say they are online almost constantly, according to Pew. The poll found that 55 percent of Hispanic teens and 54 percent of Black teens said they were online almost constantly, compared to 38 percent of white teens who said the same.

There were also differences between age groups of teens. While 50 percent of teens ages 15-17 said they were online almost constantly, 40 percent of teens 13-14 said the same.

Nearly all teens — 95 percent — said they have access to a smartphone, and Pew found that smartphone ownership is “nearly universal” among teens of different genders, ages, races and ethnicities, and economic backgrounds.

Access to a home computer, though, remains less common for teens in lower-income households.

Seventy-two percent of teens living in households earning less than $30,000 per year said they have access to a home computer. That share rose to 87 percent for teens living in households earning between $30,000 and $74,999, and to 94 percent for those living in households earning $75,000 and above.

The report also looked at which platforms teens visit most frequently, with a majority of teens saying they visit YouTube and TikTok daily.

Seventy-one percent said they visit YouTube daily, including 38 percent who said they visit it “several times a day.” Fifty-eight percent said they visit TikTok daily, including 32 percent who said they visit it “several times a day.”

Pew surveyed 1,435 U.S. teens from Sept. 26 to Oct. 23 through Ipsos. The margin of error is 3.2 percentage points.

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