Social networking websites are costing the UK economy £14 billion a year in lost work time, new research has revealed. It found around two million workers spend an hour each day on Twitter, Myspace and Facebook when they should be working. More than half of the UK workforce spends 30 minutes each day on social network sites.

In a YouGov poll published by Samaritans last December, 21% of young people aged 18-24 identified loneliness as one of their major concerns. Young people worried more than any other age group about feeling alone, being single, about the quality of their relationships with friends and family. Such figures have led newspapers to dub us the "Eleanor Rigby generation"; better connected than any in history, yet strangely alone.

Only 14 per cent confess social networking sites were the reason for them being less industrious, while 10 per cent maintain that it made them more prolific.

Lee Fayer, managing director of Myjobgroup. co. uk which conducted the study on 1000 people, said that, “Whilst we are certainly not kill-joys, people spending over an hour a day in work time on the likes of Facebook are seriously hampering companies' efforts to boost productivity, which is more important than ever given the fragile state of our economy.”

Half of the entire UK population is now on Facebook. There is however a small population that agrees with the research. A Self-confessed Facebook fanatic, Nyra Price, 20, a receptionist, said that, “Whenever I get chance, I sneak a look at work. It is the most addictive website going and I always need to know what’s going on. It does affect my work but I try twice as hard to make up for the time if I do have a sneaky look during office hours. But if the phone isn't ringing, I'll message a few mates and look at photographs. This research doesn't surprise me in the slightest.'