Living with - or without - technology (page 1 of 2)

The global market research company also learned that while a mobile phone is the gadget most people could not live without, almost one-quarter of respondent's claim they could live without any of their high-tech toys.

Synovate surveyed 5,500 respondents in Canada, China, France, Hungary, India, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Taiwan, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates, asking about their attitudes toward the latest technological devices.

Having the newest technological gadget is important to a large majority of people in Saudi Arabia (87 percent), Romania (65 percent), India (60 percent) and the UAE (43 percent). And across all countries, 46 percent of respondents say that they could not live without their mobile phones, particularly Saudis (68 percent) and Thais (61 percent). In the UAE 52 percent of the people claim they cannot do without their mobiles.

Laptops are considered the next most indispensable piece of technology across the sample (10 per cent) especially in the UAE (22 percent) and France (19 per cent), followed by plasma/LCD TVs (8 percent of all respondents). Not surprisingly, respondents under the age of 35 are most attached to these and other electronic devices such as DVD or MP3 players and TiVo systems.

On the other hand, Canadians are the most blasé about technology, with 52 percent asserting that they could live without any of their high-tech gadgets. Robin Brown, Senior Vice President at Synovate Toronto, attributes this to a number of factors. "The older population relative to some of the developing markets surveyed is one. The less significant role that these products play in showing status in Canada is another. We also tend to see later adoption of mobile technology among consumers across North America compared to Europe due to the history of our phone systems."

However the survey shows that of all countries involved the respondents in the UAE and Saudi Arabia claim that they could not live without their technological gadgets. When asked whether they could live without them their scores were the lowest with respectively 0.3 percent and 2 per cent.

When faced with a feast of choices among fast-changing technological devices, respondents are almost evenly split on what features are most important to them: Price and ease of use at 27 percent each, and brand name at 28 percent.

Ease of use is the priority for buyers in China (38 percent), Thailand and Taiwan (35 percent for both the latter). On the other hand, brand names are particularly important in India (54 percent), Romania (52 percent), Saudi Arabia (50 percent) and the UAE (43 percent). The latter respondents are also the least concerned with price (10 percent), in contrast to the cost-conscious French and Canadians (43 and 42 percent, respectively).

Andreas Gregoriou, Synovate's Managing Director for the Arabian Gulf, says these findings echo the results of the Synovate PAX survey in the region, which found that affluent consumers across the Middle East are feeling very confident and spending freely on high-end products. "Saudi consumers, in particular, are eager to buy the latest technology, and most of them would not be concerned over prices. It is also interesting to note that only 0.3% of Saudis answered 'don't know' when asked what brand they associate with high-tech products, which shows that they are extremely brand conscious."



Synovate also probed attitudes toward new technology - particularly love, fear and caution.