A survey on Internet use in different countries has shown that housewives in the UK spend more time online than the average Chinese Internet user, according to an article posted by the BBC today.
Conducted by global market research group TNS, the survey asked over 27, 500 people in 16 different countries, aged between 18 and 55, to answer questions about their internet use.
China tops the survey overall, with the average respondent saying that they spend 44 percent of their leisure time online, compared to 30 percent for the USA and 28 percent for the UK. A breakdown by occupation for respondents in the UK however, showed that housewives in the UK not only spend more time online than students or the unemployed, but also more than the average for Chinese respondents.
The survey also showed that over three quarters of German"s have met someone in real life that they first met online. The average across all countries was 60 percent, with the UK and US coming just below average - 58 and 56 percent respectively. Strangely, only 40 percent of Chinese respondents have met an online friend, the lowest of the countries surveyed.
Arno Hummerston, managing director of TNS, said, "What comes out in this survey is that we are actively engaging with people online, but we haven"t lost the knack for conventional social contact. At the same time, online acquaintances are now perceived by most of us as real acquaintances."
TNS also looked at people"s faith in traditional versus online media. The UK is the least trusting of information in newspapers, with just 23 percent saying that they are highly trusted. However, Finland is the most trusting of information in newspapers - 69 percent said that they considered newspapers to be a highly trustworthy source of information.