This has risen from 40 per cent of 15- to 19-year olds in 2000 and 85 per cent of 20- to 24-year-olds. Under-25s now own a total of 8.86 million mobile phones.
The report says that while mobile phone ownership among 15- to 24-year olds is expected to level off at 95 per cent by 2006, ownership among 10- to 14-year-olds is predicted to rise from a third to three-quarters.
Josh Dhaliwal, the author of the report, believes this is because of the increased availability of prepay phones. He says: "Growth is plateauing among higher age groups. This is because older people tend to adopt contract phones. You have to be 18 to get a contract, and before prepay phones younger people could not buy them. Now they can walk into a shop and buy a phone, or get a parent or friend to get them one."
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