Instead of Reading Newspaper, Young Americans Tweet While on the Toilet

Another indicator of how technology has changed the habits of people, loo habits included, is that instead of reading newspapers or magazines while seated on the toilet bowl, young Americans are tweeting.

Results of the Nielsen study on social media habits, published on Wednesday, found that 32 per cent of young Americans in the age bracket 18 to 24 engage in social networking while on the pot.

The use of mobile phones and tablets to read Facebook updates or tweets while in the toilet explains the 63 per cent rise in 2012 of time spent on social media sites. Among Americans, the total time spent monthly on Facebook apps reached 27 billion minutes while that for Twitter breached 3.6 billion minutes.

The figures are also indicators of how dominant Facebook continues to be compared to the other social media site with 17 per cent of people's time on the computer spent on FB, while Twitter is in second spot, followed by Pinterest.

Similar trends were reported in other countries. For instance, FB also topped the preference of New Zealanders, who spent almost 8 hours on that portal for the month of October 2012. Facebook was followed by Blogger, Twitter, Tumblr and WordPress.

The data, however, indicates the growing popularity of Twitter which has become for many young people the second screen use simultaneous with watching television. Their usage was interrelated since one-third tweeted about the shows they viewed on TV.

The report said 41 per cent of tablet owners and 38 per cent of smartphone owners watch TV at the same time while on social media sites, at least once a day.

As early as two years ago, a young man posted the following Toilet Twitter Song on YouTube, indicating the growing practice of tweeting while seated on the throne.

While pooing, people can perhaps use toilet paper with their Twitter stream printed on it. The unique toilet paper is manufactured by startup company, appropriately named Shitter.

For PharmPhily, his advice to office workers whose bosses frown on tweeting while at work is to use a toilet break as an excuse. Although, he warns there may be times that the urge to poo comes while pressing the tweet button.

One word of caution to Twitter addicts, no need to tweet your location if you are pooing at the same time.