Survey: Forty Percent of Parents Turn to Social Media for Support, Parenting Tips

Social media have served a better purpose than keeping people in touch for meaningless chit-chat. Usually, people turn to social media like Facebook, Twitter or Instagram to post their experience, learnings and adventures, paving way for knowledge.  A study published in July 16 revealed that 40 percent of parents use social media for parenting support and tips, according to Bay News 9.

A study from PewResearcCenter has learned that 75 percent of parents use social media platforms to find parenting-related information and social support. Between mothers and fathers, mothers are more engaged in social media. They both give and receive a high level of support in their networks.

Indeed, social media is a helpful tool for parenting. Some of the results of the said study are as follows:

• 79 percent of parents agreed that they were able to pull useful information in their network. Among them, 32 percent answered "strongly agree."
• 59 percent of parents admitted that they found useful information "specifically about parenting" in the last 30 days while checking the content of their social media network. Mothers are more likely to come across helpful parenting information compared to fathers, 66 percent mothers have done so in the last 30 days, while there are only 48 percent fathers who encounter the same information.
• 42 percent of parents received social and emotional support from their online network on parenting issues in the last 30 days. Fifty percent of which were mothers and 28 percent were fathers.
• 31 percent of parents who use social media have used the platform to ask parenting questions to their online network. In this area, mothers and fathers are equally likely to do so.

As for the social media tools parents use here are the details:

• Majority of the online parents, three-quarters, use Facebook. Mothers are more likely to use Facebook at 81 percent compared to fathers at 66 percent.
• 28 percent of online parents use Pinterests, including 40 percent moms and 15 percent dads.
• 27 percent of online parents turn to LinkedIn. Mothers and fathers are equally likely to use this platform.
• 25 percent of online parents use Instagram. Mothers are more likely to turn to Instagram compared to fathers, survey reveals a rate of 30 percent and 19 percent respectively. Moreover, the same study has learned that younger parents, usually below 40 are more likely to use Instagram, 33 percent versus 18 percent.
• 23 percent of online parents use Twitter. Moms and dads are equally likely to tweet.

Although between the two parents, mothers are more likely to use social media; however, this will change soon. Maeve Duggan, research associate at the Pew Research Center said, "Women have historically been more likely to use social media, but that gap is beginning to close. Social media is becoming more ubiquitous," PBS NewsHour Rundown has learned.

Pew Research Center partnered with the University of Michigan School of  Information to carry out a national survey to over 2,000 adults. Among all U.S. adults, two-thirds use at least one social media, Facebook being the most popular social network, according to the said report.