Empty-nester moms are one of the fastest-growing segments of Facebook users, a demographic phenomenon that carries a weighty social price tag. Better get used to the inevitable: publicly friending your mom.

According to a recent report by Retrevo, about 48% of Facebook parents are friends with their kids on Facebook. We’d like to see an update to this report in, say, a year’s time when that number will no doubt rise. Retrevo adds:

It looks like more parents with teenage children are more likely to be friends with their kids, although many admit it can be awkward at times but they say they do learn a lot about their teenagers, which is probably why children are so hesitant to “friend” their parents to begin with.

Naturally, any clever kid could just jack up their privacy settings to filter out a prying mom. Why not? Their parents probably couldn’t tell the difference anyway. Still, we see this as fraught with trouble. What’s the next step in teenaged Facebook awkwardness? “Dude, I just got a friend request from your mom. Her profile pic is hot!”

The Retrevo report dug deeper into the parent-child dynamic and asked parents how they generally punished their children. Most opted to simply talk it out with their kids (47%) or not let them go out (27%). But what we find interesting is that taking away TV privileges came third (at 22%), higher than taking away internet, mobile phone, and social media privileges.

The Economist just did a special report on how TV is surviving the new media age. They concluded that TV still has a big place in peoples’ living rooms despite all their favorite shows being online. The Retrevo findings confirm that TV may still be valued higher by parents and children alike, at least as a wedge to get them to behave.

Oh, and by the way, we’re friends with mom on Facebook? Ok, some of us here are.