Men's reluctance to head to the shops and not the female love of retail therapy is driving the rapid growth in online sales in the UK, according to a new report from the British Council of Shopping Centres (BCSC).

Retailers are anticipating a ten per cent swing in their customers' method of purchase from in-store to online over the course of the next decade and it is now thought that men wanting to avoid the high street will be largely behind the change.

Shopping over the internet is also a big time-saver when it comes to the number of hours spent trying to find the right Christmas gift, the BCSC study, which polled over 1,000 consumers, 65 retailers and 100 developers found.

And while men often consider shopping a chore, many women maintain their enthusiasm for a shopping trip, the study concluded.

"Women were at the opposite spectrum compared with men when it came to their future intentions," according to the recent report.

"They were certainly not planning to do more shopping online, nor did they think it was more convenient to shop online."

British consumers are expected to spend billions of pounds shopping online as in the period before Christmas.