Social-media use nearly doubles among people 50 and over

This is not your father’s social network — oh, wait a minute, maybe it is.

The phenomenal growth of Facebook, Twitter and other social sites has come in part because of a surge in adoption by older members, with a national poll released Friday saying that the share of Americans over 50 using social networks nearly doubled in the last year.

In April 2009, just 22% of Americans age 50 and over were using social networking tools such as Facebook, according to the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project. But by May of this year, 42% of Americans 50 and older were posting status updates or sending tweets. A near-majority — 47% — of people 50 to 64 are now using social networks.

“Young adults continue to be the heaviest users of social media, but their growth pales in comparison with recent gains made by older users,” said Mary Madden, author of the Pew report. “E-mail is still the primary way that older users maintain contact with friends, families and colleagues, but many older users now rely on social-network platforms to help manage their daily communications.”

While Facebook may have started as a way for college undergraduates to flirt, it may end up being the thing that closes the gap between generations, as the thorny question of whether to “friend” Mom and Dad becomes an increasingly universal dilemma, even for middle-aged people. The Pew report found that 13% of Americans 65 and older now log in to a social network on a typical day, compared with 4% in 2009.

“Social media has the potential to bridge generational gaps,” Madden said. “There are few other spaces — online or offline — where tweens, teens, sandwich-generation members, grandparents, friends and neighbors regularly intersect and communicate across the same network.”

Pew’s findings come from a nationwide survey of 2,252 American adults who were interviewed on land phone lines and cellphones. The margin of error for the total sample is plus or minus 2.4 percentage points.

Swift writes for the San Jose Mercury News/McClatchy.