Figures published by family online safety experts, Parent Zone, found 27-per-cent would first speak to a trusted adult other than a parent or career, while 28-per-cent would turn straight to the web.
Youthscape, a Christian organisation based in the Bedfordshire town of Luton, says church workers, teachers and parents need to be ready when young people comes to them upset or with a problem.
Young people and the internet*
- 75% say the internet makes them happy
- 28% said the internet was bad for young people's mental health
- 51% have found someone discussing suicide online
- 61% have seen someone talk about hurting themselves online
*Parent Box
Head of Research, Phoebe Thompson said to Premier: "Young people are potentially more savy than adults when it comes to which areas of the internet are not to be trusted and which areas are. I think they are more digitally-native than we are as adults.
"It's a useful resource for them to have if they can find the reliable and trusted websites that they are looking for and if they're able to discern between websites that perhaps not useful and websites that are useful.
"The problem often is that parents, teachers, youth workers, church leaders and mentors do not have the information or knowledge they may need when it comes to some mental health issues or some disclosures that young people might make.
"I'd encourage all parents, teachers and youth workers who are in contact with teenagers to find out for themselves what is going on what it comes to mental and young people, to resource themselves with what they need.
The survey by Parent Box suggests a parent or carer is the person a troubled young people is most likely to confide in.
Involving 220 students aged between 13 and 20, it found 34% would go to a parent or carer first if they were experiencing a problem or were upset.
Vicki Shotbolt, chief executive of Parent Zone, said: "Family life is arguably more complex now than it has ever been.
"Children have access to information, views and opinions that adults cannot control. The internet has destroyed any notions we might have had about keeping some things away from children until they were 'old enough to cope'.
"All of the indicators suggest that the prevalence of mental health problems and the severity of those problems are increasing.
"Some people are linking the internet to the increase so we wanted to speak to the young people who have grown up with technology and hear their views so that we can start to think about how best to support them."