Breaking up? Pregnant? Want a divorce? Send a text!

iGR, a market strategy consultancy focused on the wireless and mobile industry, today announced the findings of a recent study on the content of consumers' text messages. The survey asked respondents a series of questions regarding the purpose of text messages they have sent and received in the past month.

Nine percent of U.S. consumers have sent a text intended to end a relationship with a partner or cancel a date. Seven percent of the consumers have received such a text message in the past month. Perhaps unsurprisingly, according to iGR's data, 18 to 24 year olds are more likely to break up through a text message or to cancel a date via text than their older counterparts. Additionally, more male consumers than females reported both sending and receiving ‘goodbye' messages.

However, consumers do not only use text messaging to break bad news. iGR's survey found 1 percent of U.S. consumers have proposed marriage to someone via a text message - the good news is that an equivalent number received the proposal!

One percent of women have sent a text to tell their partner that they are pregnant - all of the individuals who received texts stating that their partner was pregnant were male.

iGR also found that three U.S. consumers - two men and one woman - have asked their spouse for a divorce via SMS, and two men have received a text message asking for a divorce, in the past month.

All senders and recipients of the pregnancy and divorce text messages were under 45 years old.

"We included these questions in our survey to see how far people really would go with text messages," said Iain Gillott, president of iGR. "It seems that there is no limit to what people will do with SMS!"

About iGR

iGR, formerly iGillottResearch Inc., is a market strategy consultancy focused on the wireless and mobile communications industry. Founded by Iain Gillott, one of the wireless industry's leading analysts, we research and analyze the impact new wireless and mobile technologies will have on the industry, on vendors' competitive positioning, and on our clients' strategic business plans.