32% Say their favorite way to communicate with friends is in person. Down from 49% in 2012.
54% Agree that using social media “often distracts” them when they should be paying attention to the people they’re with. Up from 44% in 2012.
42% Agree that time with social media “has taken away from time I could be spending with friends in person.” Up from 34% in 2012.
72% Believe that tech companies manipulate users to spend more time on their devices.
44% Get frustrated with friends for being on their phones so much when they’re hanging out together.
68% Agree that “social media has a negative impact on many people my age.”
33% Say they wish their parents would spend less time on their devices. Up from 21% in 2012.
Some teens silence their phones “all” or “most” of the time:
Some teens don’t ever or hardly ever silence their phones:
Social Media, Social Life: Teens Reveal Their Experiences, Common Sense Media, 2018.
Assessing Soft Skills: Are We Preparing Students for Successful Futures?
It’s equally important to assess academic knowledge and nonacademic skills, such as teamwork, critical thinking, and creativity:
80% Of Americans believe that schools’ development of students’ interpersonal skills is very or extremely important to school quality.
40% Of Americans are confident that standardized tests can measure these skills.
10% Of teachers say the formal and informal assessments used by their schools to gauge nonacademic skills measure them “very” well.
52% Of parents believe the quality of education their children are receiving is better than they received.
