The study found the use of social networking sites is not just for the young. While 78 percent of teens and 77 percent of those 18 to 24 have profile pages, 65 percent of those 25 to 34 and half of those 35 to 44 (51%) also have profile pages. The study found 30 percent of Americans who have a profile on at least one social networking site, visit them "several times a day" compared to only 18 percent on year ago.

"The use of social networking sites has expanded beyond younger consumers, with substantial numbers of Americans over the age of 35 now using social media," said Bill Rose, Senior Vice President of Marketing, Arbitron Inc.

For the first time, more Americans say the Internet is "most essential" to their lives when given a choice along with television, radio, and newspapers. Forty-two percent said the Internet was the "most essential," while 37 percent chose television, 14 percent radio, and 5 percent newspapers. While television still leads among those over the age of 45, Internet dominates among those 12 to 24.

Sixty-two percent of homes with Internet access have wireless networks in their homes, allowing for more convenient consumption of digital media in any room.

Nearly half of mobile phone owners (45%) text multiple times a day. Three quarters of teens (75%) and those 18 to 24 (76%) text multiple times a day compare with nearly two thirds (63%) of those 25 to 34.

Growth of residential broadband has leveled off with 84 percent of home with Internet access having broadband connections. The slower growth of residential broadband is associated with little year over year change in weekly usage of online radio (17 percent) and online video (29 percent). The study indicated the expanded use of mobile devices and in-car Internet may bring about the next wave of growth.
 

This is a significant increase compared with results from just three years ago when only 27 percent agreed with the same statement.

"The average consumer’s expectation that newspapers will ‘always be there’ has eroded dramatically since we began tracking this question in 2007" said Bill Rose, senior vice president of marketing at Arbitron.

"This perception cut across nearly all age groups, except those age 65 and older" added Edison President Larry Rosin.

The findings come from a national survey of 1,753 people ages 12 and over. This is the 18th in a series of studies Arbitron and Edison have conducted since 1998 on topics relating to the Internet and New Media. The complete study will be presented in a webinars on April 8 at 2PM EDT.
 

The number of people who listen to the radio online has increased from 12 percent in 2007 to 20 percent in 2008. During the same period the number of workers listening to traditional radio dropped from 88 percent to 80 percent.

The research revealed that education played a big role in workers choosing to listen to radio online. Thirty percent of college graduates listen to online radio most often compared to 12 percent of non-college graduates.

"For a growing number of people, obviously especially among those whose work is in front of a computer all day, the Internet is simply a better solution for ‘radio’ listening than a traditional AM/FM Radio," said Larry Rosin, president of Edison Media Research.

"Thus radio stations need to think about the quality of their streams, and promote their streams. After all, on the Internet, the competition is not just the other stations in town; instead the possibilities are essentially infinite."

Marketers should be able to take advantage of the growing online radio audience listening during working hours.
 

Thirteen percent of American listened to online radio in the past week; an increase of two percentage points from January 2007.

Sixty-three percent of online radio listeners have a profile on social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook or Linked-In. One-third of online radio listeners with a social network profile visit their social networking site nearly everyday or several times a day.

The most popular social networking sites among online radio listeners are MySpace and the business networking site Linked-In. Twenty-eight percent of online radio listeners have a MySpace page and 24 percent have a profile on Linked-In.

"Social networking is clearly not about creating exclusive, self-enclosed communities," said Diane Williams, senior analyst, custom research for Arbitron.

"We found that online radio listeners are more than one and half times more likely to have a profile on a social networking site as compared to average Americans and that they tend to be power-users with one-third of online radio listeners logging on to their social networking site nearly every day or even multiple times per day."