Teen texting hits new heights (infographic)

We reported late last year on a Nielsen study that found teenagers were averaging 3,417 text messages a month, more than any other group. It turns out that female teens are pumping out almost 4,000 texts a month, while their male counterparts apparently “only” find out 2,815 texts a month. How is the average parent or interested reader to keep track of all these numbers? An infographic of course!

As luck would have it, OnlineSchools.com has provided just such a resource, and it lets you check out the above information and a whole lot more in a friendlier manner. For example, while 3,417 texts a month sure sounds like a lot, it turns out that breaks down to about 7 texts per waking hour. That doesn’t seem quite as crazy, since a back-and-forth sequence of texts can rack up several times that number over the course of ten minutes.

And there’s a positive aspect to that texting increase – teens are spending less time talking on the phone, as teens used an average of 572 minutes of talk time a month in 2011, down from 685 minutes per month in 2010. So perhaps there will be fewer times when your teenager won’t stop talking on the phone at dinner time.

For all this and more, spend some time perusing the Generation Text infographic to the right. Any resemblance between the infographic and a particular model of smartphone is surely a complete coincidence…