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Financial Institutions

Earlier today, we reported that Americans now spend 17% of all of their online time on social networks. This makes a lot of sense and many readers commented that Facebook or Twitter are the first things they pull up on the web every single day.

But what types of individuals are the the heaviest users of social networks and social media? According to a new study put out by Nielsen Claritas, if you live in the U.S. and use Facebook, LinkedIn or MySpace, you are likely to be more affluent — and more urban (that is, live in a larger city) than the average American.

Demographic Differences Between Facebook and MySpace

Even back in 2007, there was heavy discussion over the differences between the MySpace and Facebook demographics. Of course, much has changed in the past two years.

Facebook usage has skyrocketed and the types of users that flock to both services has changed (and are, on average, much older than they were in 2007). These changes seem to have created a disparity in wealth between users of the world’s two largest social networks.

According to the Nielsen study, users in demographics in the top third relative to affluence were 25% more likely to use Facebook than those in the lower third. Conversely, users in the lower third demographic profiles were 37% more likely to use MySpace than users in the top third.

Nielsen also found a strong correlation between Facebook users and users of LinkedIn.