In February 2007, Nielsen Net Ratings 
reported interesting statistics about the usage patterns of Internet users around the world. This study explores browsing the Web at work as well as at home.
Users spend an average of 31 hours per month surfing the Web. This data suggests that the average user goes online once a day for a session that lasts about an hour.
Users visit an average of 43 pages and spend about 45 seconds on each page, suggesting that users are interested in skimming over the contents of a page, rather than spending time going in depth. This could explain why more and more sites seek to provide as much information in as attractive a form as possible.
Currently, over 327 million pages are actively visited out of a possible 491 million.
The statistics in the United States are similar to the global statistics, except that users spend more time per month online, perhaps due to a higher number of users with access to broadband. Broadband users have unlimited access, whereas people who use dial-up are charged on a time basis.
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings
Interestingly, a Pew/Internet study in 2005 revealed some differences in the ways that men and women surf the Web. Men tend to search for information on a wider range of topics than women do. Women, however, tend to “penetrate deeper into areas where they have the greatest interest, including health and religion.” Although women under 30 and African-American women do more surfing than their peers, slightly more men use the Internet than women overall.
These types of statistics are important to advertisers who look to the Web surfing habits of users to determine where and how often to advertise. In 2001, the popular Internet service provider America Online, who initially showed a high commitment to protecting the privacy of its members, abandoned its practice of not tracking its customers and began using Web bugs and cookies to better target advertisements.
References
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