Twitter may be reason for your Break-Up

According to new research, active users of social networking who are in a romantic relationship may find that Twitter-related conflicts cause relationship problems that can become serious enough to result in infidelity or divorce. To reach this conclusion, researchers from University of Missouri-Columbia evaluated the amount of time a person spends on Twitter.

They looked at how much conflict arose between couples as a result of active Twitter usage and whether negative relationship outcomes were associated with active Twitter use and Twitter-related conflict. "The idea was to characterise the relationship between active Twitter use, Twitter-related conflict and negative relationship outcomes," said Russell Clayton from University of Missouri-Columbia.

Clayton found that active Twitter use and Twitter-related conflict were positively associated with an increase in emotional and physical cheating, break-up and divorce. These outcomes, however, were not impacted by length of romantic relationship. The study appeared in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.