About 134 million American adults have cell phones and 27 percent of them say they have used the text message feature on those phones within the past month. That represents 34 million people who use a cell feature also known as short message service or SMS.

Of those who use the texting feature on their phones, 28 percent say they have received unsolicited commercial text messages on their phone.

The findings come from a nationwide phone survey of 1,460 cell phone users by the Pew Internet & American Life Project between January 13 and February 9.

The most likely cell phone texters are in Generation Y (ages 18-27). Fully 63 percent of those with cell phones in that cohort are texters, compared to 31 percent of cell phone owners in Generation X (ages 28-39), 18 percent of cell phone owners among younger Baby Boomers (age 40-49), 13 percent of cell phone owners among older Baby Boomers (ages 50-58), and 7 percent of cell phone owners among those over age 60.

"The proliferation of cell phones and the spread of text messaging are changing patterns of commuication for many Americans -- espeically younger ones," said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. "These technologies are introducing new notions about what it means to be 'present' with someone else and about what it means to be in conversation with them. For some cell phone users, the stream of conversation hardly ever ends."

However, younger American adults are less likely to be cell phone owners than their elders. Fully 76 percent of those in GenX own cell phones and 75 percent of younger Baby Boomers own them. Some 68 percent of GenY and 68 percent of older Baby Boomers own cell phones, as do 62 percent of those over age 60.

Cell phone texters also tend be technologically oriented. Some 58 percent of texters have broadband at home and 73 percent have at least six years experience with the internet.

But it is also true that 9 percent of cell phone texters say they are not internet users.