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Study finds that face-to-face interaction is still preferred by youngsters

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By The Drum Team, Editorial

October 21, 2010 | 2 min read

A new survey has found that young people would rather have face-to-face interaction with their friends than communicate with them through technology.

The study, conducted by Ci Research on behalf of McCann Manchester reviewed the social media habits of 500 young people aged between 17 – 26 from across the UK during the summer.

It was found that three quarters of respondents said that they would rather meet their friends in person than stay in touch online, although 62 per cent also said that SMS is the most important way of communicating for them, while 38 per cent relied on their mobile phone while 18 per cent of 22-26 year olds said they still used landline the most.

For 28 percent of respondents, Facebook was said to be the most important way to communicate, while three per cent thought Twitter was the most important communications method.

Only one per cent relied on MySpace and Four Square.

Robin Wilson, director of Social Media and PR at McCann Manchester said: “This study indicates that communications and social technologies are an important part of young people’s lives and the way they communicate with each other - but they are not the only way.

“What this survey shows is that nothing really beats face to face communications for this age group.”

“This is interesting as it proves a theory that we’ve been working with for some time –that when communicating with this age group, brands need to take an approach that uses new social channels and more traditional routes to reflect real life communications.”

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