Are YOU a ‘social tourist’? Looking at your mate’s holiday snaps on Facebook makes you feel like you’ve been abroad, poll says
Four in ten adults say they experience 14 countries every year, even though they have actually been to nine in total
MILLIONS of Brits admit they now travel the world through their friends' and family’s holiday posts on Facebook.
Four in ten adults say they are ‘social tourists’ who experience an average of 14 countries through social media updates every year, even though they have visited a total of nine countries in reality.
More than two thirds of those adults had been inspired to travel more widely after seeing the social media posts though.
In fact, three in ten people said social media is their biggest influence when choosing their next holiday destination – with a fifth surfing the likes of Facebook purely for travel inspiration.
Around a fifth of people surveyed also admitted taking photos when on holiday with the sole purpose of making friends and family jealous.
Pictures of New York are the most common holiday snaps to appear in our social media feeds - followed by Spain in second spot and France in third.
The Eiffel Tower is the landmark that appears most often in people’s social media feeds, while the Statue of Liberty is the second most common and Disneyland in Florida the third most frequent.
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The average Brit takes 85 photos when on holiday – a 38 per cent increase on the 62 snaps taken five years ago.
They also take 39 minute’s worth of video footage, up from an average of 22 minutes five years ago.
However only a fifth of photos taken and 14 per cent of videos filmed will actually be uploaded to Facebook, Twitter and other social media.
The research of 2,000 adults who have Twitter and Facebook accounts and have ever been on holiday was commissioned by , provider of all-inclusive holidays.
Jeremy Ellis, Marketing and Customer Experience Director for First Choice, said: “For many of us, social media has made the world a little smaller – inspiring us to visit destinations we might not otherwise have considered and encouraging us to share our holidays with friends and family too.”