People in Ireland think about sex on a daily basis - 3.68 times per day to be exact. That’s far higher than the European average of 2.86 times. The Irish are also second only to Spain (1.72) in thinking about vacations at 1.65 times per day.

The lustful Irish top the poll for saucy thoughts beating even the amorous French (2.23) and the Italian stallions (2.19).

That’s according to a European wide survey commissioned by lastminute.com. The survey was taken by 7,200 respondents across Ireland, UK, Spain, Italy, France, and Germany.

It found that on average, Europeans think about vacations 1.42 times in a typical day, with sex entering the conscience 2.86 times per day.

Carey Withey of lastminute.com says: “We had rather a lot of fun with this survey. Anecdotally, we know people like to spend time thinking about getting away on a great vacation or city break but we wondered how this stacked up against carnal thoughts.

“Our findings revealed that, for women, vacations and sex are fairly matched. As for men, the old cliché still stands: some things never change! But whatever you like to think of, research has shown that a little daydreaming always helps with relaxation.”

Perhaps surprisingly, women in the warmer, sultry climes of Spain and Italy admitted to thinking about vacations more than sex in an average day while Irish women proved themselves to be the most red-blooded, topping the survey for thoughts of sex and surpassing their thoughts of vacations - 1.73 versus 1.51 times per day.

Irish men are stereotypically thinking of vacations and sex almost all the time. Vacations come in at a chart topping 1.79 times per day and thoughts about sex are as regular as 5.48 times per day, second only to those in the UK.

Overall, European men tend to spend a lot more headspace thinking about sex. On average, they think about desires of the flesh 4.3 times a day while the desire to get away registers less on their radar: for every one moment of vacation-dreaming, European men have three erotic thoughts.