The new bog-standard: Study reveals Kiwis' mobile phone habits

Here's something to think about before you next shake hands.

New Zealanders' mobile phone habits are, quite literally, in the toilet.

Call it the new bog-standard.

A new study of 1000 Kiwis, carried out by Colmar Brunton for Vodafone NZ found more than half of us use their mobile while sitting on the toilet (see table below).

One in 10 said they always check their phone while on the dunny.

A further 18 per cent confessed to doing so "very often", some 22 per cent 'sometimes" and 11 per cent "not often".

Of the throne-alone crowd, 55 per cent were male.

The study also found that 59 per cent of people prefer to be contacted by txt than voice call.

Some 74 per cent always or sometimes use their mobile phone while watching TV.

The most common reasons for running out of data were "Being somewhere where I can't access wi-fi" (66 per cent) and "not realising I'm using data at home instead of wi-fi" (42 per cent).

Two equally likely culprits - "Not knowing what apps use the most data" (blamed by 16 per cent) and "Kids watching video on my mobile device" (4 per cent) got off relatively lightly.

Only 21 per cent confessed to checking their mobile immediately before going to sleep, and only 19 per cent immediately on waking up.

Some 14 per cent claimed they waited an hour or more before sneaking a look at their phone. The rest fell in between.

In terms of keeping things close, 70 per cent said they slept with their mobile beside their bed, 9 per cent had their phone in the bedroom but not within arm's reach and 22 per cent left it elsewhere in the house.