ONE IN FOUR Singaporeans download movies, and one in five download songs from the Internet, with the heaviest users downloading over 20 movies and songs every month, according to a new study on media habits here.

Streaming media was even more popular among Net-savvy Singaporeans, with six in 10 enjoying streaming music from sites like Last.FM, and over half catching TV shows like the hit Crime Scene Investigation series off sites like Youtube.

The results are not surprising, said Nielsen's executive director Rebecca Tan, in light of the 'large proportion of ... connected and computer-savvy' people here 'thanks to the government's relentless drive to harness the power of infocomm technology.'

The company polled 26,000 users in 52 markets last year, including 500 here, for the survey. It published the results on Wednesday.

The survey does not make a distinction between users downloading or streaming legal or illegally obtained media, although "countries plagued by content piracy problems are also likely to perform strongly", the firm said.

Piracy may even benefit consumers, helping to 'keep the cost of acquiring music down on both CDs and downloads', said Ms Tan.

The results are in line with the survey's other findings, that Singaporeans are among the world's biggest media device owners and users.

Some 97 per cent of households here own computers, 38 per cent own portable gaming consoles like the Sony Playstation Portable, and 35 per cent have gaming consoles like the Microsoft Xbox.

Globally, Singaporeans are the world's second biggest owners of entertainment technologies, behind Ireland and ahead of Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand.