UK singletons Europe's most miserable, says poll

The fictional Bridget Jones may be Britain's most famous singleton but she is not alone in being lonely and looking for love, according to a Europe-wide survey published on Thursday.

More than half of single Britons (51 per cent) admit to being often lonely, while British men were found to be the unhappiest in Europe about their singleton status.

More than 5,000 single men and women aged 25 to 50 were quizzed about their attituded to the single life in Austria, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland.

Spaniards came out tops as the most sex-crazed and the biggest party-goers.

The survey found British singles were the most pessimistic about finding a partner but were the most active in doing something about getting one.

Some 65 per cent of British singletons admitted to spending "a lot of time alone", the highest in the survey.

Austrians, the most worried about their style and appearance, wasted the least time in approaching a member of the opposite sex, while the French came out bottom for making the first move.

British singles seem to be the most shy flirters: 60 per cent of them would hang around waiting for other person to break the ice, the survey found.

Across the eight countries, 40 per cent of singles had been without a partner for three years or more, a third were chasing long-term love while 42 percent though they could find it on the Internet.

The survey was coordinated and compiled by the German research institute Innofact AG for the online dating service PARSHIP. A PARSHIP spokesperson said: "If you want to have fun as a single person, Spain is probably the place to be".

"Spanish singles spend least time alone and score highly on party-going. Those stories about hot Latin blood seem to be true too."