(CNN) -- Status updates, photo tagging and FarmVille aren't just for adults or even teenagers anymore.

Researchers say a growing number of children are flouting age requirements on sites such as Facebook and MySpace, or using social-networking sites designed just for them.

Facebook and MySpace require users to be at least 13. But they have no practical way to verify ages, and many young users pretend to be older when signing up.

Some scientists worry that pre-adolescent use of the sites, which some therapists have linked to Internet addiction among adults, could be damaging to children's relationships and brains.

But many other experts say there's not any solid research to back that up and that most children seem to use social-media sites in moderation, and in positive ways.

"For the most part, although there's so much press about all the bad things they're doing, much of what they do on these sites is stuff they would be doing anyway," said Kaveri Subrahmanyam, a professor of psychology at California State University-Los Angeles.

In two surveys reported this year by Pew Internet Research -- of 700 and 935 teens, respectively -- 38 percent of respondents ages 12 to 14 said they had an online profile of some sort.

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According to MPAA advertising guidelines, if a movie producer or distributor creates an adult site to advertise an R- or NC-17-rated movie, the site “must be accessible only through a suitable age-verification system that blocks access by children.”  MPAA Advertising Handbook at 35 (2006) (on file with Commission staff).  Universal Pictures informed the Commission that it acquired age verification technology from a third party, enabling it to restrict certain designated content on the website for Miami Vice to adult users (18 and over) for clips and other materials.  See Letter from Carolyn A. Hampton, Vice President - Legal Affairs, Universal Pictures Business and Legal Affairs, to Keith R. Fentonmiller, Staff Attorney, Federal Trade Commission, at 1 (Sept. 18, 2006) (on file with Commission staff) (for the Miami Vice website); Telephone Conversation with Carolyn A. Hampton, Vice President - Legal Affairs, Universal Pictures Business and Legal Affairs (Oct. 17, 2006).  To access certain content, users were advised that they must be over 18 years old to proceed, and instructed to input their names, birth dates, and zip codes.  The web page stated that the information would be checked against government records.  The information then was sent directly to Verification Integrity Financial Assurance Corporation (“Verifac”), a company that specializes in providing age verification services; this information reportedly was not stored after the verification process.  After a successful verification process, the visitor was allowed into the restricted site, which at the time included movie clips containing violence and profanity.

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