I’ll freely admit that I’ve been caught up in the craze that is Twitter. The tool has become a staple part of my working ”diet” and, while I’ll admit that it certainly hasn’t replaced more conventional forms of communication, I think it’s a very worthy addition to my repertoire.

I currently don’t have a personal Twitter account as I much prefer Facebook for keeping in touch with friends, and I’ve never had a MySpace page, but a new piece of research has got me questioning whether this reveals anything about me as an adopter of social media.

According to a study from Harvard Business School, the networking tools that we select - and the ways in which we use them - could be less a matter of choice and more a case of genetics. Bobbie Johnson’s blog on the Guardian website broke down the results and suggested some common trends in Twitter usage:

- Men have, on average, more followers than women
- Men are almost twice as likely to follow other men than they are women
- Women are also more likely to follow men

That’s despite 55% of users on Twitter being women.

In a female dominated office, it’s difficult to comment on whether our male counterparts are inherently more likely to use Twitter than we are. Almost everyone at Berkeley PR, regardless of gender, has a Twitter account and is actively using it for networking, research and debate.

However, when I look at my own lists of followers/followees, it’s difficult to ignore the imbalance of men and women. Is it just because I work in technology PR that I happen to be linked to more male PROs, journalists and social media experts? It’s a difficult one and perhaps I’m not the best case study because of the gender bias that still exists in the industries that I am intersted in and involved with.

So, is Twitter for men and Facebook for women? I very much doubt it. Perhaps we just need to spread the word further and encourage more women to set up and account, get tweeting and kick the gender imbalance into touch.

Rebecca Wheeler