When it comes to social-networking sites, women are more plugged in than men, according to data analysis by Brian Solis, president of Silicon Valley public-relations firm Future Works.

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Aaron Smith, a research specialist at the Pew Internet and American Life Project, said that the organization’s April tracking survey, which inquires about a number of Internet-related activities, found that 50% of women, compared with 42% of men, reported having ever used social-networking sites.

“Men are more likely to use transactional types of tools, like online banking,” he said. “Not to say that men don’t like to talk, and that women don’t need to get information, but in general when we look at the overall picture, we see women gravitating toward those applications that allow them to connect with friends and share information with people they know.”

An exception in Mr. Solis’s study was Digg, where 64% of users are male. While Pew’s Mr. Smith said that Pew hasn’t examined gender breakdowns on Digg, it makes sense that men, who tend to use social networking for the purpose of sharing information, would be more interested in such a site.

However, gender gaps have narrowed regarding overall Internet use. A few years ago, men were more likely than women to be online, said Mr. Smith, but that’s no longer the case. “In general, a lot of the general gender differences in Internet usage that we saw have pretty much gone away,” he said. “It tends to show up more in the applications they use than whether they go online and whether they have a computer.”

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