In a survey carried out by Emo Oil, the largest fuel distributor to homes farms and businesses in the UK, it has been found that British adults are not very handy when it comes to DIY and household tasks. The survey included 1,439 UK adults, with 19% of those asked admitting that they didn’t know how to change a lightbulb safety.
This survey shows that with technology advancing, British adults aren’t learning how to carry out household maintenance tasks as a necessity and are instead turning to the internet to work out how to complete a task. In a time before technology, being able to change fuse and a lightbulb were important pieces of information. However, with the rise of the so called “School of Google”, with answers a few clicks away, is it unnecessary to know how to carry out general household maintenance? Information of this nature used to be passed on through the generation, but now it seems with the rise of convenience, and perhaps a lack of interest, British adults are using the internet when a problem arises. Despite this increase in the use of Google, 38% of those included in the survey have also said that they have turned to their parents for advice when carrying out household tasks, with 23% admitting to asking friends and 12% asking their neighbours. Perhaps passing on knowledge the more traditional way hasn’t been wiped out yet.
More than 1 in 3 of those asked, 41%, said that they didn’t know how to turn off the water for their property at the mains. With this simple task leaving a lot of British adults unsure, there were some who didn’t know how to carry out even more obvious maintenance and less technical jobs such as descaling their kettle, with 16% left baffled.
