Mobile phones: we're dependent and it's changing our relationships
Observe any train carriage, bus, pavement, pub, burger bar, shop, someone will be texting or chatting or taking a photo.
Brits are obsessed with their phones, to the extent that 90% said they couldn’t go a whole day without using their phone.
Hour, more like.
The mobile phone can also act as a deterrent: 54% of females under 25 said they had used one when out alone to put people off from approaching them.
1 in 10 people have had their handset stolen; at the same time, nearly half said they would use their mobile to record a crime in progress.
The Carphone Warehouse, who commissioned the survey, concluded that there are six ‘tribes’ of mobile users:
- Generation Mobile: 18-24s students/1st jobbers
- Phonatics: 18-34s – mobile very important
- Practical Parents: young price-conscious families
- Fingers and Thumbs: middle-aged – presumably not too tech-savvy
- Smart Connected: 25-44s use mobiles for work and social life
- Silver Cynics: approaching retirement
In related news, over half of mobile users aged 18-24 have used their
phone to ask someone out (or be asked out) on a date, or exchanged
sexually-explicit text messages.
Only half agreed that flirting via text message (with someone else, presumably) would be a form of cheating on their partner.
"It acts as a kind of subliminal zone, an exclusive forum where the
normal social rules are suspended," said Kate Fox, director of the
Social Issues Research Centre.
Are you in the 90%? Could you go without your mobile for a day?
