Getting Started

Welcome! This blog will be investigating the relationship between media and teenagers, specifically the effect of media on teenagers. I feel like it has not been that long since I was a teenager myself; yet already things like the current media devices and the many available social media platforms have completely altered the way many teens interact, view the world, and even live. Presently, I am around both teenagers and “tweens” on a daily basis, and I am amazed at all the differences between what things were like when I was there age and what it is like today.

It seems as if everyone has at least one digital music player (which is an iPod, more often than not), cell phone, and laptop computer—if not more.  In fact, these devices have become so prominent in the lives of teenagers that it is difficult to find a teenager who does not have one or more of these items within reach at all times. When they are at home, my brothers are rarely found without both their respective laptops and cell phones on hand. When watching television, for example, both devices are present and being used.  God forbid they miss the most recent status updates or cannot text their friends for an hour.

Having been observing this phenomenon for some time, I have become very interested in what all of this media has done to change this generation next in line for adulthood.  A good starting point for some background facts and stats is the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project. In fact, thus far in my research, their research has been an invaluable resource.  Amanda Lenhart’s recent presentation, “How do [they] even do that?” A Pew Internet guide to teens, young adults, mobile phones and social media, contains a wealth of basic information, so I have included it below:

"How do [they] even do that? A Pew Internet guide to teens, young adults, mobile phones and social media

View more presentations from Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project.

One of the most interesting things I found was that it is a pretty safe assumption to say that teenagers are constantly texting: 31% of teenagers send over one hundred texts per day!  That’s a pretty crazy statistic (girls average 125; boys, 101). Surprisingly (or maybe not), text messaging is the largest growing form of communication for teens. Besides being annoying (have you ever been talking to someone who whips out her phone to have a texting conversation with a friend at the same time?), the increase in text communication brings up some other problems, particularly things like the growing “sexting” trend.

Some of the topics that will be addressed in this blog will include: teens and their mobile phones, sexting, cyberbullying, privacy issues, social networking sites (like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc.), twitter, effects of information sharing and access, video games, and whatever else comes to light.  For example, to what degree have social networking sites supplanted face-to-face social interactions? Learning more about teenagers and their use of modern media technology is key in understanding in which direction the world is headed. Hopefully, I will have some expert answers to some of my own direct questions—in fact, I was waiting on some before I posted this week, but it looks like I will be working on incorporating the material in future posts, as everyone is rather busy these days.

Something to think about is the future: where is all this taking us? Will teenagers continue to send as many texts and be as active on social media networks as they become young adults and beyond? A San Francisco Chronicle article from July asks some of these same questions, but does not really have an answer. For instance, as an anonymous survey respondent put it: "Generation Y is heading for a social networking hangover. Big-time…The level of personal information sharing - forever stuck in the Web and beyond their control - will haunt many of them as they enter adulthood, like virtual tattoos that cannot be removed."