Washington: Parents globally spend 1.3 times more on Facebook than non-parents, keeping tabs on teens and sharing their kids’ key milestones, a new study has found.
Facebook IQ, the social networking site’s consumer research programme, embarked on a multi-phased research study of 25 to 65-year-old parents of infants, toddlers, adolescents and teens around the world. It analysed Facebook and Instagram data across eight markets and gathered feedback from 8,300 parents and five parenting experts. Having a child changes everything, including parents’ relationship with their mobile phone.
Moms’ and dads’ mobile phones have become their lifeline to managing schedules, keeping tabs on teens and sharing their kids’ key milestones, Facebook IQ said in a blog post. By observing behaviour on Facebook, we see that parents over-index on mobile usage. In fact, parents globally spend 1.3 times more time on Facebook mobile than non-parents, the blog added.
Millennial parents (ages 1834), were 30 per cent more likely than Boomer parents (ages 5065) to use their mobile devices to make more informed purchasing decisions, the study found. As many as 83 per cent of the parents surveyed said they have access to more information than their parents did. As many as 70 per cent said they are more informed than their parents were this is particularly true for 76 per cent of Boomers, who gained access to the internet and mobile devices later in life than their younger counterparts.
Over 50 per cent of parents globally said their child has more impact on purchasing decisions than they did in their family growing up. And 50 per cent believe they listen to their child more than their parents listened to them. Around 38 per cent of parents said their family is at its best when they are at their best. Parents are increasingly realising that if they take care of themselves first, they will be able to deal with their daily responsibilities and stresses and tend to their family’s needs in a loving and energetic way, the blog said.
PTI