Pew Internet has released some new research on the use of Twitter, based on “just-collected’ survey data. The research finds that 13% of adult Internet users have used Twitter (up from 8% in November 2010).

The report digs into who exactly is using Twitter, demographic wise:

Pew does say that Twitter use is spreading to a wider range of ages, adding that those between the ages of 25 and 44 experienced notable adoption growth since late 2010.

The above chart would appear to indicate that Twitter is largely for the young. We have to wonder what the number look like when it goes younger than 18. Twitter does seem to be popular among the high school kids these days.

The report says that among Twitter users who own a cell phone, just over half (54%) have used their phone to access the service.

The report gets into race, finding that non-whites (and African-Americans in particular) “continue to be at the forefront of Twitter adoption.” One quarter of online African-Americans use Twitter, with one in ten doing so on a typical day, Pew says. Clearly there are some races/ethnicities missing from the chart.

Twitter is doing a lot things now to get more people in general using the service, and more importantly continuing to use it. Rumor has it that they’re about to launch their own photo service, and they recently acquired the popular third-party client TweetDeck, which offers a multi-pane view, making for a richer Twitter experience than Twitter itself currently offers. They’re also doing more to get users to find accounts to follow, giving them a reason to keep using Twitter. Just yesterday, they launched a new follow button for sites.