Phone calls have gone the way of the rotary dial, right? The signs are everywhere, it seems. We’re all texting and messaging our head’s off. Even Drake’s
upset about some lady friend not calling anymore.
But, that's just not the case. Across
all ages and races, the number of calls we make and receive has stayed relatively stable this year, according to new findings from Nielsen Mobile Insights.
In fact, over the past year, the
number of calls across all ages and ethnic groups has changed less than one call per day, on average.
As for text adoption, the percentage of subscribers that use text messaging only increased
one percentage point over the past year -- rising from 78% to 79%, according to Nielsen.
Yet, people do appear to be spending less time on phone calls. Year-over-year, the number of minutes
spent on the phone has decreased for those aged 25 and over.
However, those aged 18-to-24 are actually spending more time on phone calls. Indeed, these young people spent 33 more anytime
minutes on calls during the third-quarter 2015 than they did during the same period a year earlier.
Measured by race, African-Americans spend the most time talking on their phones, and their
talking time is actually up, year-over-year.
Comparatively, however, all other races and ethnicities used fewer minutes, including Hispanics, who spent the second-most amount of time on the
phone.