Aussies 'love and split up online'

One in 10 people from Australia have been dumped via a text message and the same number have used SMS to tell someone "I love you" for the first time, a new survey has suggested.

According to the survey, one in seven people aged 18 to 24 think it is acceptable to end a relationship with an SMS or a posting on social media and more than half of Australia's under-35s use text messages as the main form of contact after a first date.

Pure Profile's survey of 2000 Australians, commissioned for internet dating site eHarmony, has found that one in five has sent or received a risque photo including 10 per cent of the over-45s.

One in 20 Australian adults are dating online, the survey found, and a quarter of them are likely to use SMS as the main form of contact after a first date.

10 percent of Australians confess to having dumped a lover with an SMS.

E-Harmony's senior research scientist, Californian psychologist Gian Gonzaga, says texts avoid face-to-face confrontation and conflict - at a cost.

"But breaking up is a very difficult thing to do and sometimes people take the easy way out with a text message.

"You'd hope that people are able to treat others with the respect they deserve.

"The more impersonal the break-up, the harder it is on the individual at the other end," he added.

Dr Gonzaga advised people to only send text messages they would want to receive themselves.

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