The counselling service Relate has said the pursuit of a so-called "Hollywood-ideal" and growing concerns about money could lead to a spike in New Year break-ups.

Stress and pressure of trying to create the perfect Christmas may have been behind the 53 per cent in calls to the national phone line in January of this year compared to early December 2013.

Relate counsellor, Priscilla Sim, said the first month of the calendar year was a time of reflection that people could see as an opportunity for a new beginning.

She said: "People are thinking about their lives, their relationships, and they kind of want to go into the new year fresh and they don't want to bring in all the burdens of the past year and the past few years if the relationship hasn't been going that well.

"So I think we see quite a high volume of calls in January due to that. It's kind of like, you have three choices: You either stay as things are, you leave the relationship or you try and change. And a lot of people do opt to try and change and work things out.

"People want to have this great family time and sometimes it's just not like that. So it can be quite difficult, with particularly money worries.

"That's like the highest concern at the moment for people that have been surveyed in Relate surveys. I think 40% of people are worried about money and not being able to buy the right presents, having big arguments within families on Christmas Day.

"The pressure on couples to provide for children, if they want to get them the latest toy that's out or the latest computer games - things are expensive.

"And inviting people round and making big dinners, all of that costs money. And that's just an extra pressure on the relationship when there's maybe stuff that's going on already for them.

"I think in society, in glossy magazines, and on TV, we're kind of expected to have this Hollywood ideal of relationships.

"So when they have an argument it's the end of the world, when actually research shows that arguments are healthy. Obviously if you're arguing all the time that's difficult, but I think the ratio is one in five.

"If you're having five positive interactions to one difficult interaction you've got a healthy relationship. It's important to have arguments because that shows that you're still two individual people."