Facebook has released the results of its Messenger instant messaging survey, and the data isn’t too surprising.
Results were gathered from 9,264 respondents from the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, Germany, Brazil, France and South Korea. The highest percentage of respondents — roughly 24 percent (or 2,255 exact respondents) — were from the U.S.
According to the survey results, there’s been a 67 percent increase in messaging communications over the past two years, compared to a 14 percent increase in letter-writing in the same timespan. Interestingly enough, however, there’s also been a 34 percent increase in face-to-face communication over the past two years.
So while more people use messaging services — like Facebook Messenger — there are also more people communicating in-person.
To those who claim that instant messaging conversations are less meaningful or authentic, 66 percent of respondents who message said they have “more authentic conversations,” while 61 percent of respondents who message said that they have “more authentic relationships.”
On the subject of relationships, of those individuals surveyed who use dating apps, 34 percent said that they continue their conversations from a dating app on messaging. There’s still good news for those people who prefer to meet IRL, however; 26 percent of respondents said that they prefer to continuing a data app conversation face-to-face.
As for what makes a great conversation, 64 percent of respondents said that a great conversation needs to be “genuine”; 49 percent said that a great conversation needs to be “thought-provoking”; while 46 percent of respondents said that a great conversation needs to be “free-flowing.”
The survey also gleaned some interesting data on inviduals who have so-called “sidebar conversations.” These are conversations that are had during a regular work or school day.
According to the survey, 71 percent of respondents said that they have “regular” sidebar conversations, while 60 percent said that they have sidebar conversations daily.
Additionally, 82 percent of millenials have sidebar conversations, compared to only 49 percent of boomers.
The survey also looked at respondents’ use of non-written communications.
Almost all respondents between the age of 13 and 18 — 92 percent to be exact — said that the use emoji. This is compared to 77 percent of respondents aged 56 to 64. Especially interesting is that 56 percent of respondents said that they’ve sent a message exclusively using emoji.
Gifs were also a popular form of communication, with 83 percent of respondents aged 13 to 18 used the Graphics Interchange Format in conversation. In contrast, 53 percent of respondents aged 56 to 64 used gifs.
Americans sent more humour gifs than every other country combined; Germans sent the most angry or bored gifs; while Brazilians sent the most photos and gifs that expressed some form of love.
Facebook Messenger is used by approximately 1.3 billion users every month.
Update 16/11/17: An earlier version of this story stated the most respondents were from the U.S. This has been changed to clarify that the highest percentage of respondents were from the U.S.
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