Although U.S. teens spend more time using digital media than Chinese counterparts, teens in Bejiing are more likely to own iPads, according to a micro-survey by Stanford University.
About 45% of the high schoolers polled in China had an iPad while only about 15% of those in Palo Alto – roughly 13 miles from Apple headquarters in Cupertino — did.
Although the sample size is tiny – 70 teens total between the ages of 16-18, broken down into 41 females and 30 males – there are a few interesting ideas from the Stanford Program on Regions of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (SPRIE) survey.
- 44% of Beijing teens owned iPads; 16% of Palo Alto respondents did.
- Palo Alto students spent about twice as long (two hours a day) on social networking sites.
- Beijing teens were much more likely to watch videos and films online.
- Over 90% of Chinese respondents said they have friends they know only over the Internet.
“In certain urban locations, today’s teens are native ‘netizens’,” said Marguerite Gong Hancock, associate director of SPRIE. “Most teens in our survey in both Palo Alto and Beijing have had mobile phones since the age of 12. They lead a large part of their daily lives online.”
I’d be curious to know what the adult iPad owning percentage of those same teens is. My armchair guess? The California kids may not own iPads but are using the family device…
