What are children under 13 doing on social media?

Officially, social networks are prohibited for children under 13 years old. In reality, as revealed by the Heaven agency following its unpublished study* on the subject, 87% of 11-12 year olds (excluding YouTube) have an account there and publish content there regularly. This is 10 points more than in 2020 and it rises to 93% among 12-year-old children. “We expected the figure to stagnate but it continues to grow,” comments Arthur Kannas, president and co-founder of the agency.

The locomotive remains Snapchat, whose attendance rate for 11-12 year olds reached 54.5% in September 2022, up 12 points since 2020. [licenciement de 20 % des effectifs , NDLR] in which it finds itself”, emphasizes the author of the study. “For children in 6th grade, Snapchat makes it possible in particular to keep in touch with CM2 friends who are not in the same college,” says the study.

Instagram victim of Facebook’s reputation?

The little ghost application even widens the gap on TikTok, second in the ranking with 44.2% adoption rate, up 5 points since 2020. “This network is above all a platform for consuming entertaining content, with its humorous and dance videos, rather than socializing,” notes Emmanuel Berne, director of studies for the agency.

Number three, Instagram (which put its Instagram Kids project on hold in the face of criticism) stagnated at 23.6%, “a surprise” for the Heaven agency, while the Meta subsidiary leads, with its Reels format, the big offensive to beat TikTok in the game of vertical videos – a moult that earned him the wrath of the Kardashian clan, and a backpedal. If some young people fall back on Insta when their parents forbid them TikTok (a lot of content is replicated), others claim to perceive it “clearly as a copier”…

For the authors of the study, the consolidation of the brands of the ex-Facebook under the Meta banner, and the bridges thrown between the platforms – Instagram invites for example to publish its Reels also on Facebook – does not work in its favor. “For the first time, I heard children say that Instagram is like Facebook,” points out Emmanuel Berne. However, among young people, the social network “has a bad reputation about the management of their personal data”.

strong awareness

This is the other lesson of this study. The 11-12 year olds, born in a world where Facebook and YouTube already existed, show a certain maturity vis-à-vis privacy issues and, even more surprisingly, time spent on screens. A very large majority (80%) maintain their accounts in private; so only 2 out of 10 kids post public content.

They are also 4 out of 10 to consider spending too much time on their smartphone, “a very strong increase in awareness (+10 points) in two years”, notes Emmanuel Berne; but they are 32% to wish to spend more time on their mobile! The study also measured that 19% of these 11-12 year olds find that their parents spend too much time on their smartphone. Finally, 52% know that their parents geolocate them, compared to barely 34% in 2020.

A ridge line

“We see a change in mentality, most children are now aware of the risks to which they may be exposed”, notes Arthur Kannas. “As for the time spent, it is linked to the appearance of parental control tools. “On the distinction of sponsored content also, “often, they are not fooled”: 48% find that there is too much advertising on the networks.

With these young users, the platforms are walking on a real crest line, illegality on one side (Instagram was fined 405 million euros for failure to protect the data of minors), and acquisition of the future audience of the other. Arthur Kannas is formal: “We have enough hindsight to see that people do not change platforms with age but age with the social network, and make it evolve. The first example: Facebook.

*MethodologyBorn Social study conducted by online questionnaire at the beginning of September with 9,967 children aged 11 and 12 from the Digital Generation database, and 200 children from the IDM Families panel.