Parents shouldn’t worry because their children spend too much time in front of a computer, and think that their social skills are affected. Such electronic devices are beneficial for children. At least this is what a new study by the MacArthur Foundation and the University of California at Berkley revealed.

The research, done by 28 experts over a three-year period of time, focused on the value of social networking, text messaging and other types of new media use.

The findings showed that teens are in fact learning significant social and technical skills, frequently in ways adults do not comprehend or appreciate. Does it surprise you? Well, we understand you, since electronic devices are unrelated to the skills that people need in order to interact and communicate with the other members of the society.

“It certainly rings true that new media are inextricably woven into young people’s lives,” according to Vicki Rideout, vice president of the Kaiser Family Foundation and head of its program for the study of media and health. Ethnographic reports, such as this one, are good at informing the public about how teenagers “fit social media into their lives. What they can’t do is document effects.” This draws attention to the need for “larger, nationally representative studies.”

For the study, no less than 800 youngsters were observed on the Internet for over 5,000 hours. Their parents also participated in the research, which was titled “Living and Learning with New Media.”