Average Teen Sends, Receives 60 Texts a Day

Get ready for a shocker: A new survey found that teenagers are texting more nowadays than they did just a few years ago.

The survey of 799 U.S. teens ages 12 to 17 years old, released Monday by the Pew Research Center, found that the typical teen sends and receives 60 text messages a day, up from 50 in 2009. Overall, 75 percent of all American teenagers text.

"Teens are fervent communicators," Amanda Lenhart, senior research specialist with the Pew Internet Project, wrote in a report about the survey findings. "Straddling childhood and adulthood, they communicate frequently with a variety of important people in their lives: friends and peers, parents, teachers, coaches, bosses, and a myriad of other adults and institutions."

When it comes to how they communicate with those people, 63 percent of teens say they text every day, while 39 percent talk on their cell phone, 35 percent socialize face-to-face outside of school, and 29 percent message on social networks. Twenty-two percent of teens instant message every day, while 19 percent talk on landlines and just 6 percent email.

And while teens still talk on the phone, they are calling their friends less frequently, the survey found. Fourteen percent of teens say they talk with their friends on a landline every day, down from 30 percent in 2009. Another 20 percent say they talk daily on their cell phone with friends, down from 38 percent three years ago.

Older female teens are the "most enthusiastic texters," sending 100 texts a day in 2011, on average, compared to just 50 for males the same age, according to the survey.

Meanwhile, the survey also found that about one in four teens now owns a smartphone. Twenty-three percent of all those ages 12 to 17 say they have a smartphone, with ownership highest among older teens. Thirty-one percent of those ages 14 to 17 say they have a smartphone, compared to just 8 percent of those ages 12 and 13.