Social networks not hot anymore

Updating their status on the Facebook wall or Twitter handle no longer fascinates the Delhi youth, states a survey.

Around 200 people, in the age group of 12-25 years, were interviewed in Delhi for a survey by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry, under the aegis of ASSOCHAM Social Development Foundation (ASDF).

The survey was conducted across urban centres of various cities during October to December 2011.
Around 2,000 youth were interviewed. The report aims to examine the current trends on social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Linkedin, Myspace, Friendster, Hi5, and others, among youngsters and the time spent on them.

Around 60 per cent of the youth in Delhi said their fascination and the time dedicated to social networking sites has reduced significantly. Over half of those interviewed in Delhi said they surfed the sites earlier, but are not interested in them anymore.

“Tech overload is apparent among youth and their fixation with social media seems to be eroding as they have started focusing on more important things than grooming their digital identities,” said D S Rawat, secretary general of ASSOCHAM at the release of the survey.

The survey revealed that majority of the respondents across cities tend to replace social interactions with virtual social media interactions which has led to insomnia, depression, poor inter-personal relationships, lack of concentration, high-level of anxiety, ignorance and rudeness in their general behaviour.

As a result about 55 per cent of the youth surveyed have consciously reduced the time spent on social media websites and are no longer active on their favourite social networks. Nearly 30 per cent of the urban youth interviewed had also either deactivated or deleted their accounts from such websites due to breach of privacy.

The survey also suggested a new trend emerging in these urban cities, as almost 20 per cent of the youth prefer to access chat applications like BlackBerry messenger, Watsapp, Nimbuzz, Mig33, Google talk and Yahoo messenger on their mobiles and computers over social networking sites.