YouTube has overtaken Facebook to become the most favourite site among teenagers, according to a survey conducted by research firm The Futures Company. The study called the 2013 TRU Youth Monitor, published by Mashable, reveals about 50 percent of teens surveyed voted for YouTube as their favourite site, while Facebook stood second at 45.2 percent.
The list includes the likes of Amazon (27.8 percent), Google (25 percent), Twitter (19.5 percent), Yahoo (12.1 percent), eBay (10.7 percent) and Tumblr (12.3 percent).
The research firm had surveyed teens in July and discovered that 41.6% of those aged 12 to 15 rated Facebook as their favourite website, 48% of teens overall. Last year’s study saw 12- to 15-year-olds rating Facebook as their favourite site.
Facebook, however, is still most popular among those in their 20’s. About 55 percent of twentysomethings voted for Facebook as their favourite site, while Amazon bagged second spot at 37.5 percent. Twitter saw a mild growth among the 12 to 29 group with 16.5% rating it as their favourite website vs. 14.1% last year.
“Our new findings do suggest some weakness for Facebook, but I need to preface everything we discuss here with the fact that Facebook remains the favorite website overall among our sample of 12- to 29-year-olds,” says Rob Callender, director of youth insights at the Futures Co. “That said, Facebook achieves that distinction thanks to twenty-somethings.”
Elaborating further, about 18.3 percent of teens aged 12 to 15 asserted “I’m addicted to Facebook,” as compared to 30.5 percent of twentysomethings. “This suggests parental controls aren’t the issue. Rather,” says Callender, “it appears Facebook might not be creating as many new fanatics as it once did.”
The new report comes days after Facebook had acknowledged a decline in the number of “younger teens” using the social network on a daily basis.
“Youth usage among U.S. teens was stable overall from Q2 to Q3, but we did see a decrease in daily users partly among younger teens,” Facebook CFO David Ebersman had said.
Source: Mashable