Finding a lifelong partner is a difficult and complicated exercise. From initially meeting someone to agreeing to spend your lives together there is a journey of discovery. Your visions for the future, your values and overall compatibility. Deal-breakers are sprinkled in amongst the byzantine canvas that is a human. Ideas on children or where to live can often end a relationship but so can barracking for the wrong football team. Opposing views on vaccination or veganism or climate change might make it difficult to share a life together. It might even be incompatible star signs. When all is considered, it is amazing that only one in three marriages end in divorce.
Well as if it wasn’t complicated enough, new data reveals that the type of smartphone you use can create tensions in relationships. In particular, iPhone users have more annoying smartphone habits!
I give my kids a hard time if we sit down in front of the TV to watch a movie. The opening credits have only just started and they are already on their phones. They tell me it is to amuse themselves while the boring parts of the movie are playing. I am not sure you know which parts of the movie are boring unless you are watching it! My logical argument is ignored and they continue playing on their phones until a significant event occurs and then they ask me what just happened. You can imagine my answer. “You should have been watching and then you wouldn’t need to ask me!” It turns out that 75 per cent of iPhone users look at their smartphone while watching TV. It is known as the ‘second screen’ experience. This compares to 59 per cent of Android users.
Second on the list of annoying habits was using your phone while having a conversation with your partner. In this scenario, 66 per cent of iPhone users were guilty compared to 51 per cent of Android users.
While eating at the table with your partner, 64 per cent of iPhone users continued to use their phones compared to 42 per cent of Android users. I remember sitting at a café with some friends (actually talking to each other) and we looked at a table nearby. Four people sat around the table not saying a word to each other. They had their heads down and were furiously tapping away on their phones. I decided it would be fun to join them so I pulled my phone out of my pocket and dragged a chair over to sit at the same table and imitated their actions. When they finally realised I was sitting there and asked what I was doing, I explained that I assumed that this was the table for strangers to sit at while using their phones. They gave me some subtle advice as to where I should go next! I laughed inside but I am not sure if they understood my point. In my day you visited a café to talk to friends. I failed to notice if the four of them were iPhone or Android users.
The great irony in all of this is that a separate survey revealed that iPhone users were 76 times more likely to receive a match on a dating app than an Android user. Breaking down the Android group further, Samsung users were still in positive territory but if you have a smartphone made by Google; Sony or Huawei your stocks dropped dramatically – although not quite as far as BlackBerry users who were at the very bottom.
Tell me your relationship technology deal-breaker at ask@techtalk.digital.
Mathew Dickerson