African American

[Editor's Note: This is the latest quarterly update to this article, this time containing Q1 2013 data and trend analysis.] There's a strong perception that with the rise of social media, mobile device usage, and other such digital trends, youth have put TV on mute. According to the most recent cross-platform report [download page] from Nielsen, traditional TV consumption continues to drop off on a year-over-year basis among 18-24-year-olds, though the rate of decline slowed somewhat in Q1. Read more »

Few viewers are drawn to TV shows because they saw something about them on social media, finds the Council for Research Excellence (CRE) in a new study [pdf], and despite the buzz about social TV, daily interaction with social media concerning TV is still relegated to a small minority of consumers. But, the study finds there is significant room for growth: the proportion of study respondents who interact with TV-related content on social media on at least a weekly basis is triple those who do so on a daily basis (37% vs. 12%), and the data also shows that social plays a bigger role in drawing viewers to new than existing shows. Read more »

Tablet adoption is rising quickly, and has reached majority penetration in certain segments of the population, according to [pdf] results from a new survey conducted by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. In the latest survey fielded last month, Pew found 34% of American adults reporting ownership of a tablet, almost double the 18% adoption rate it found in a survey fielded in April 2012. Looking at the demographics of tablet ownership, the latest study finds that adoption spikes in the 35-44 age bracket, and appears to rise alongside educational attainment and household income level. Read more »

61% of American cell phone owners can be classified as smartphone owners, according to a new study [pdf] from the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. That's slightly higher than a recent comScore estimate of 58% mobile market penetration (though that was in the 13+ population, rather than the adult population), and leads the researchers to note that it means that 56% of all American adults are now smartphone owners. The study notes that smartphone ownership is higher among younger age groups, and similar increases within each group alongside household income level. Read more »

The Council for Research Excellence has taken a look at mobile video viewing via a large survey of Americans aged 15-64 who have broadband internet access at home and watch at least 5 hours of TV per week. The study divides the respondent sample into 3 groups: those without mobile devices; those with them, but who do not watch TV on their devices; and those who own mobiles and watch TV on them. Among the findings of the study [pdf], just 2% of all TV hours logged were on tablets (1%) or smartphones (1%). Read more »

71% of American adults aged 21 and older drink some type of alcohol, whether that be beer, hard cider, liquor, wine, or wine coolers, and Millennials (21-34) make up 27% of that group, according to [pdf] a study from Scarborough. The researchers, dubbing this group "Shaken and Stirred Millennials," examine some of their characteristics, as well as their purchasing and media habits. Read more »

A lot has changed in the past 5-10 years, but the endurance of McDonald's as an American fast food icon seems to have stayed firm. According to a new study [download page] from Placed, McDonald's was easily the most popular fast food chain in April of this year, with slightly more than half of Americans visiting one of its restaurants during the month. Back in 2008, McDonald's was rated Americans' favorite quick service restaurant (QSR), and that was for the 5th-year running. In this latest study, Placed finds Subway clearly in the second spot, visited by about 4 in 10 Americans during the month, followed by Starbucks (25%), Burger King (24.7%), and Wendy's (23.8%). A demographic analysis shows large discrepancies in preferences by ethnicity. Read more »

A new analysis of Census Data released by the Pew Research Center details a dramatic rise in the percentage of households with children that count the mother as the primary or sole source of family income. The study indicates [pdf] that the proportion of such households with the mother as primary or sole breadwinner has almost quadrupled in the past half-century or so, from 10.8% in 1960 to 40.4% in 2011. While the majority of those "breadwinner moms" are single mothers (63%), a significant 37% are married mothers who are pulling in more income than their spouses. An accompanying survey by Pew finds the public holds mixed feelings about this trend. Read more »

Online teens' use of social networking sites appears to have leveled out, but more are turning to Twitter, according to [pdf] results from a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. In 2012, 81% of online teens (aged 12-17) surveyed reported using a social networking sites, relatively flat from 80% a year earlier. But, the proportion of teens who reported using Twitter jumped from 16% to 24% in that time span, growing to outpace adoption by adults (16% in 2012). The researchers note that not all teens think of Twitter as a social networking site, though: there is a small subset of respondents who say they do not use social networking sites, but do use Twitter. Read more »

Millennial (18-35) women are 52% more likely than their male counterparts to agree that they "love to shop" (44% vs. 29%), per results [pdf] from an Urban Land Institute (ULI) survey conducted with Lachman Associates. While young men are more likely than young women to say that shopping is a necessary chore that they can deal with (15% vs. 9%), they're also more likely to say they shop when it's necessary, and enjoy it when they do (51% vs. 45%). Overall, the study indicates that America's youth enjoy shopping on the whole, which might explain why they're more likely than other generations to identify as "spenders" rather than "savers." Read more »