Smartphones and Sex: How the tech in your pocket affects life in (and out of) your pants

EDITORIAL

By Derek Kessler | Feb 14 2014 | 6:07 pm  | 43 COMMENTS

One week ago we asked you about how your smartphone factors into your dating, romance, and sex lives. And while we expected quite a response, we didn't expect this much of a response. More than 17,000 of you took part in our survey in the past week, and the results were interesting, to say the least.

There are plenty of interesting correlations and divergences based on age groups and platform choice. Some are not at all surprises, others caught us by surprise. For example…

• When on a date, those aged 18 to 24 years are 35% less likely to actively use their smartphone while on a date than those 35 and older.
• Opinions of relationship statuses drop quickly, with 27% of ages 18 to 24 believe them to be asking for trouble, vs. more than half of those 55 and older. BlackBerry users are 22% more likely to believe so.
• All age groups hold an ideal of an in-person break-up being ideal and using a phone call, text, or email as less so, yet the actual rates show hypocrisy in practice, though the younger you are, the more likely you are to have been in a breakup over text messages.
• Nearly half of those who carry sensitive photos of their significant others on their smartphone do so without the protection of a PIN or password.
• Men are 50% more likely to want to receive frequent sexts than women (no surprise there).
• Universal platform agnostic solutions like MMS, email, and Skype are the most popular for sexting, except that BlackBerry users show a preference for BBM. Skype is also the overwhelming favorite for cybersex, although iPhone users prefer FaceTime by a slim margin.
• Men are 78% more likely to look at porn on their smartphones than women.
• BlackBerry, iPhone, and Windows Phone all have a shortage of porn apps, so users get their porn predominately through web browsers, Tumblr, and Reddit.

Check out the huge interactive infographic below (it's huge, it'll probably take a little while to load) — several of the charts allow you to cycle through data displayed by age groups and platform choice — and let us know what you think in the comments!

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