A joint survey by the Telenor Research & Innovation Centre Asia Pacific (TRICAP) in Cyberjaya and research firm Synovate found Malaysian youths to be tech-savvy users of mobile phones and digital communities.

“That research shows that the mobile phone is used to obtain instant updates on important happenings and hence, deemed to be the most versatile and important portable device by all respondents, regardless of location, age and gender,” said Jens Olav Bjørnson, managing director, TRICAP

It also shows that most joined digital communities to stay in touch with friends or they succumbed to peer pressure such as being asked, “Do you have a Facebook, Friendster or MySpace account,” or similar questions.

Fifty percent and 48% of those in their early 20s (20 – 24 years) and teenagers respectively were influenced to join by their friends, while 60%  of the late 20s and 53% of those in their 30s (30 to 39 years) joined in response to a friend’s invitation via e-mail or online.

A small minority of 10% overall wanted to be the first movers online and to influence their friends to join and the early 20s were the most aggressive among this minority, with 14% joining for this reason.

Curiosity and wanting to try it out, was cited for joining by 48% overall, with teenagers and the 30s leading with 52% and 49% respectively.

On use of digital communities, 92% overall used it to staying in touch with friends, while 71% overall used it to make new friends and here, females led males in the former with 95% and 89% respectively, while males led females in making new friends in the latter with 75% to 65% respectively.

“This shows that males are more adventurous online, while females tended to maintain and consolidate the online friendships they already have,” said Sheena Lim, Telenor head of Market Research and Customer Insight.

Collaborating with course mates and colleagues, sharing music and videos online figured pretty low, with 25% overall in both cases using digital communities for these purposes, while being part of a professional network, meeting a new romantic partner and playing games online were the lowest in order, with 18%, 16% and 7% overall using digital communities for these purposes respectively.

Another interesting pattern was how the respondents use digital communities and other electronic communications channels as layers of acceptance of people they meet online or in person and digital communities are the outermost layer for maintaining contact with new friends or more accurately acquaintances – namely, people whom they know sufficiently to be on friendly terms with but with whom they’ve not yet sufficiently developed bonds, trust and acceptance.

As acceptance increases, the acquaintance is elevated into the more exclusive circle with the exchange of e-mail addresses, later promoted to an instant messaging buddy, and finally they exchange mobile numbers to enable SMS and voice communication.

This is reflected in the importance placed on the people they maintain contact with online, with 35% citing close friends already know in person, while 23%, who’re teenagers, regarded their schoolmates as most important online contacts and 17% cited virtual friends whom they not met in person as their most important contacts.

Each person on average had 140 contacts each, with females leading males by 148 to 132 contacts respectively and 92% overall added new contacts to be able to connect with their friends.

Making new friends came next with 64% overall, with teenagers being the most prolific with 77% doing so for this reason.

Only 33% overall added contacts with others because they had attractive content to share, while a relatively small 18% overall did so because they like the other person’s look and style and in both cases, teenagers led with 42% and 27% respectively in both cases, and once again, males were more outgoing in this respect.

SMS and voice

As for whether they would rather send an SMS to or call another person, over 50% of respondents said they would most likely SMS their friends, best friends or others in their 20s, while calls were reserved for older persons in ascending order by age, probably in deference to progressively older recipients being less savvy to reply.

Fifty eight percent said they would SMS someone they knew fairly well who was in their 20s but this proportion dropped dramatically to 12%, 2% and 1% respectively for recipients known fairly well who are in their 40s, 60s and 80s, while 27%, 56%, 45% and 28% respectively would call people in these age groups respectively in ascending order of age.

The rest did not know anyone to SMS or call within these four age groups in ascending order of age, ranging from 12% of recipients in their 20s to 71% of those in their 80s.

Malays and those under 25 years predominating among the 69% who said they would most likely SMS their best friend, while Chinese and those in their late 20s predominated the 37% who would rather call their partner.

Those under 25s predominated the 62% who would SMS a new friend, while the late 20s and Indians predominated the 26% who would call.

Teenagers and Malays predominated the 8% who would SMS their parents, while Chinese and Indians predominated the 87% who would call, while the late 20s predominated the 40% who would SMS a colleagues and the 25% who would call.
 
Only 29% said they would engage in lengthy conversations often or very often via SMS and most were teenagers, while 13% would say things in an SMS often or very often which they would otherwise not say face-to-face or in a phone call. However, in both cases, 60% and 75% respectively were willing to use SMS for these sometimes or rarely.

As for expressing their true feelings to others, 44% would feel better doing so via SMS and most of these are teenagers but less of them are Chinese.

Thirty nine percent would call for this purpose and most are Chinese, while the remaining 17% preferred face-to-face communication, with a predominance of those in their late 20s.

Headquartered in Norway, Telenor is one of the world’s largest mobile operators, with interests in 12 countries, including DiGi in Malaysia, DTAC in Thailand, Grameenphone in Bangladesh and Telenor Pakistan.

Opened in May 2006, TRICAP is Telenor’s first research & innovation centre outside Norway and it works seamlessly with the centre in Norway by leveraging upon Malaysian and Asian customer insights and it collaborates with domestic and regional partners to develop innovative services and concepts which are shared among Telenor’s mobile operations worldwide.

TRICAP currently has 20 staff of different disciplines and specialisation, most of whom are Malaysian, with the rest from neighbouring countries and from Norway, and TRICAP also has staff exchanges with the Norwegian centre.