1 in 3 women switch off from conversations within 15 secs

Work talk, TV soap gossip, household chores and complaining are the subjects that are most likely to make them "switch-off."

One in three women who took part in the survey confessed that they often had to "pretend conversations," where they nodded and agreed without having any idea of what was being said, the Daily Mail reported.

However, over a third of women also felt that their partners were not listening to them intently and a quarter of men admitted to switching off in the first 10 seconds of a conversation with their other half.

Meanwhile, men were twice as likely, as women to stop listening during a conversation about "thoughts and feelings" or gossip.

The research was conducted by hearing specialists Hidden Hearing, that stressed that while many people are simply tuning out after losing interest in a conversation, an increasing amount of them may actually be experiencing significant hearing loss, which affects about 10 million in the UK.

"To listen properly we need to be able to hear properly and there is a big difference between switching off because something is uninteresting, and being hard of hearing," Peter Sydserff, audiologist at Hidden Hearing, said.

"Hearing loss can have a huge impact on a person's social and private life, often leaving them feeling isolated and unable to join in with life, but this is not something people need to put up with; expert advice and a simple free hearing screening can fix all that," he said.