Texting by American adults has increased significantly over the past year, but still does not approach the level of text messages exchanged by young people, according to a new report from Pew Internet American Life Project.

Nearly three quarters 72 of adult cell phone users send and receive text messages now, up from 65 percent in September 2009. The majority 87 of teen cell users text. Teens text 50 messages a day on average, five times more than the typical 10 text messages sent and received by adults per day.The majority of African Americans and Englishspeaking Hispanics own cell phones compared to 80 percent of whites.