Sex split for mobile phone use

Mphone's managing director said that in two years' time, the market for stylish phones will be a lot bigger

Women and men are different in many ways, and it looks like the differences stretch to how we use our mobile phones too.

Women are more likely to see their mobile phone as a tool for staying in touch with family and friends, while men use theirs mainly for work-related calls. That's according to a new survey by online mobile phone retailer mPhone.co.uk .

Nearly a third of the men polled (28 per cent) regarded their mobile as "primarily a tool for work". In contrast, only 7.7 per cent of women felt the same. And almost half the female respondents said their mobile phone provided a way of staying in touch with family members and friends. Only 35 per cent of men shared that opinion.

Organisational tool

Both genders agreed that their mobile phones were essential for organising their social lives. Some 24.1 per cent of men and 23.6 per cent of women admitted to mainly using their phone for this purpose.

Interestingly, although only 2.4 per cent of men saw their phone as a fashion item, less than 1 per cent of women felt the same.

"Despite the survey suggesting that people don't see their phones as fashion items there is a powerful, fashion industry led and heavily financially supported, move in this direction," said Ali Mahmoud, managing director of mPhone.

"The trade is beginning to make inroads towards changing this view with last year's release of the Motorola D&G (Dolce & Gabbana) phone and more recently with Prada 's entry into the mobile phone market, in partnership with LG ."

"This is an inexorable movement and my prediction is that a survey similar to this in two years' time would show radically increased interest in the mobile as a fashion item," Mahmoud said.

Mphone.co.uk polled 1,000 UK adults as part of the survey.