Social media may not be the online playground for teens that many suspect it is, according to a new study from Forrester Research.
More than four out of every five U.S. adults use social media at least once a month, according to Forrester's study, and that's a 46 percent growth rate from last year.
Studies surfaced earlier this year pointing out that Facebook's demographics skewed toward an older audience than expected, but the new numbers indicate social media's growth is being fueled by older users, while teenagers show little interest in broadcasting their lives.
Teens account for a very small percentages of users on the biggest social networks. Only 9 percent of Facebook's users are between the ages of 12 and 17, and only 14 percent of MySpace's users fall into that age group, according to The New York Times. Among Twitter users, only 11 percent are teenagers.
Participation in social media by adults between the ages of 18 and 35 is nearly universal, according to Forrester, with only 10 percent of that population group being inactive in social media. Among adults 55 and older, about two-thirds are active in social media.
