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A Quantitative Analysis of Online Dating

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the mountain-of-a-man-seeks-woman-who-smells-like-pizza dept.

imjustatomato writes "Never before has something so human and primitive as dating been reducible to such discrete values. A study analyzes the data of an online dating service. When do you like someone like yourself? Among online dating members, "marital status" and "wants children" are the two most influential characteristics to match. Other interesting findings are: men initiate 73.3% of messages, but their initiations are 17.9% less likely to be reciprocated; 78.2% of messages are never responded to."

43 of 283 comments (clear)

  1. how I met my wife by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    I wrote that I wanted to relax on a couch with someone getting high and watching insects having sex on the Discovery Channel.

    1. Re:how I met my wife by speculatrix · · Score: 3, Funny

      that's how I met your wife too! BTW, your bathroom fan's bearings need replacing, and your bedroom curtains are hideous.

  2. That's odd... by Mr.+Samuel · · Score: 5, Funny

    100% of my messages are never responded to.

  3. RTFA? by ari_j · · Score: 5, Informative

    Why not link to TFA? Here is a more direct link to the research. I wonder why we got linked from the summary to another summary. Maybe because the summary is new today but the research is 2 years old.

    Anyhow, none of the numbers seem all that surprising, except that 55% of active members are women (63% of all members were men).

    1. Re:RTFA? by DynaSoar · · Score: 3, Interesting

      > none of the numbers seem all that surprising, except that 55% of active members are women
      > (63% of all members were men).

      "Members" are anyone who'se ever signed on for an account and not deleted it. They keep the numbers looking good by continuing to carry these. Not surprising, ISPs have done this for a long time. Men don't remain active members because they get so little response (ref. the original paper).

      Women remain active more because they tend to keep coming back to the chat rooms, mostly with other women. They hang around just in case a guy comes along to try to chat with them. Then they'll all play hot chat with him, and afterwards fail to respond to him at about the same rate as in email.

      I've been doing some research of my own. But I don't see anything surprising enough about it that makes it worth writing about. It's the same sort of behaviors I've seen since the time when BBSs started gaining general public members, prior to the spread of internet connection turning them into ISPs. I'm not surprised by the fact the article is new and the paper is 2 years old. I'm surprised that someone bothered to write a paper about something that's been going on for 15 years. On the other hand, it was a master's thesis. Very few academics care what master's students write about as long as the research is done halfway decent.

      --
      "I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
    2. Re:RTFA? by ObsessiveMathsFreak · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Anyhow, none of the numbers seem all that surprising, except that 55% of active members are women
      No, no, no, no. We're talking about the internet here. You must add a qualifier. 55% of active members say that they're women.
      --
      May the Maths Be with you!
    3. Re:RTFA? by neoform · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I'm still surprised that no one has caught on to the fact that of the top 10 dating sites right now, at least 4 of them employ the use of fake profiles and even pay employees to chat with their members in order to get them to pay for premium membership. I know, because i've seen it happening first hand.. why doesn't anyone catch on to this?

      Ever recieve a flirt/wink from another rather attractive member, only to find he/she doesn't reply back when you message them? Or how about receiving large numbers of flirts/winks in a very short period of time when your member profile contains close to no information?

      Do a test yourself. go to www.mate1.com, make a profile, but profile no personal infomation about yourself. wait a week and see what happens. odds are you'll be messaged by about 15 people who are all supposedly interested in you.

      --
      MABASPLOOM!
  4. Online dating by Lord+Kano · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I had mostly positive experiences with online dating after my divorce. I met several women, some were romantic friends, some were regular friends and one just didn't work out at all.

    LK

    --
    "Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
    1. Re:Online dating by ozmanjusri · · Score: 5, Funny
      and one just didn't work out at all.

      That'd be the one you married then?

      --
      "I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
  5. double entendre by macadamia_harold · · Score: 5, Funny

    Among online dating members, "marital status" and "wants children" are the two most influential characteristics to match.

    Uhh, yeah. I'm going to guess that the phrase "wants children" means something different, depending on whether you're on a dating site, or on alt.sex.lolita. Yes?

    --
    Push Button, Receive Bacon
  6. Re:Interesting article but talk about padding... by cperciva · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I can't believe how many blank pages there were in this dude's thesis! Interesting work, but come on, at least do what we normally do when we can't make our 90 page requirement... use larger fonts, make the margins 1.5", double-lines, etc.

    A thesis doesn't have to be long in order to contain good research. My doctoral thesis is only 81 pages, and 20 pages of that is overhead (front matter, table of contents, list of symbols, preface, advice to the reader concerning the order in which chapters should be read, epilogue, and references).

    --
    Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
  7. Religion and Smoking by sleepwellmyfriend · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I always thought discrimination against religion and smoking were bidirectional. Religious people are more likely to not want to date non-religious types, than the other way around. Non-smokers will prefer to date non-smokers, but I doubt smokers have much of a preference. It would be interesting to see if there are characteristics that work in the opposite manner. Opposites attract, don't they? Guess not

  8. This surprises me not one bit. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I think it's fair to say that there's a lot of factors at play here:
    1. Communication. Email (and other text-based mediums) miss out on several communication cues. Tone of voice, body language, etc. are important to figure out exactly what is meant. I can write something and mean it in one way, but that doesn't mean the person at the other end will read it that way - they could just as easily (especially if they're having a bad day) cast it in a negative tone in their mind.
    2. Expectations. Wouldn't surprise me in the slightest to find out that men (and women!) online are looking for the "perfect partner". Newsflash, people: there's no such thing. Everybody has their flaws. Doesn't matter who they are.
    3. Appearances (which comes in with expectations, I suppose.) If you're not 'beautiful', you're evidently not worth knowing. Dig a little deeper, people. There's more to beauty than stick figures like you see in those fashion magazines ...
    My experiences with online dating? I've met five, maybe six, people that way. One's a decent friend still. One, it's too early to tell (but my feeling is "nothing more than friendship".) The rest, I haven't seen much of beyond the early meetings.

    All in all, my Quest for Non Single Status shall henceforth be conducted off the computer. Between the cost, the frustration of usually never getting a message back (I'd rather hear "thanks, but I don't think it'd work out" than never hear back at all - at least then it's a clean break), and generally getting out and about in the real world a bit more than when I was a teenager, I think I'll be much happier for it. Do I need somebody? Hell no. Do I want somebody? Yes. But I'd rather be single than with the wrong person.

    1. Re:This surprises me not one bit. by bzipitidoo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Did they confine their research to just Match.com? Because my experience with the greedy Match.com was poor. If you haven't paid, not only can you not send messages, you can't read messages others send to you. Even if those others have paid, you can't read their messages. When I was a paying member, I got one genuine unsolicited message which was from a woman who seemed nice but was more than twice my weight, and one genuine reply which was, sadly, negative. The rest of the messages I got were spams and scams. I wasn't doing as well as a 10% response rate, let alone the even higher numbers this research claims. Possibly it's because I refused to put down an income range. After I quit paying, I was still getting notices whenever someone sent me a message, but no info on who sent it or what the message was. A wink at least mentioned who. Damned if I was going to pay more just to find out it was another scam message. Now I think Match.com's lousy policies had a lot to do with the low response rate. It's not that all the women really were that rude, or swamped, it's that Match.com stinks. I get much better response rates on okcupid.

      --
      Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
    2. Re:This surprises me not one bit. by Bill+Dog · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Even if those others have paid, you can't read their messages.

      I wonder if that was made clear to paying members, before you send them. Or before you join.

      I was similarly disappointed when I tried out the system of eHarmony a year ago. I could understand not being able to initiate communications until becoming a paying member, but I was very surprised that I couldn't communicate back. Someone who could initiate with me would have to be a paying member. But to me this lessens the value of membership. Esp. if they aren't told when someone they're being matched up with isn't currently a member and as such cannot respond. Otherwise they're partly paying for the privilege of being tricked into helping the site recruit more members.

      --
      Attention zealots and haters: 00100 00100
    3. Re:This surprises me not one bit. by king-manic · · Score: 4, Funny

      Appearances (which comes in with expectations, I suppose.) If you're not 'beautiful', you're evidently not worth knowing. Dig a little deeper, people. There's more to beauty than stick figures like you see in those fashion magazines ...

      I though that once upon a time. Then I realized I wasn't ugly and have been shallow and self gratifying ever since. It works for me.

      --
      "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
  9. my observation by aliscool · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I recently spent two months on Match.com and by and am pleased with the end results... I am dating someone I met on there.
    You really have a hard time weeding through the mass amounts of spam email (I realize you are looking for someone in Virginia, but Montana is only 6 hours away), the obvious scammers mostly with .ru email addresses. The old I need a visa and it costs 600 American dollars thing.
    Also there are a fair amount of women that fall into the FREAK category.

    I would disagree with this point made in the paper "Among online dating members, "marital status" and "wants children" are the two most influential characteristics to match."
    From my limited experience on Match, I think the most important thing women were looking for was income range. I initially had that on my profile and got swamped with replies, after hiding that bit they slowed way down.

    1. Re:my observation by rossifer · · Score: 4, Informative

      I just married one of the woman I met on match.com in 2003, though the path to getting here was exhausting. I had 13 first dates where either I was interested but she wasn't or she was interested but I wasn't. By the time my wife searched for me and sent me an email, I was very tired of the whole thing and about ready to throw in the towel. But it looked like I would have an interesting conversation with this one last woman, so I went to the coffee shop and had an amazing night.

      Too many women (and probably men) are putting up unrealistically flattering photos, which means an unpleasant suprise in person. My wife unintentionally put up fairly unflattering photos and when I saw her in person, I had to check the room again, as I was so pleasantly suprised. I told her that her photos didn't do her justice and that was the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

      Just remember that dating websites only kinda solve one part of the problem. They get you introductions to people you would never otherwise meet. If they're honest on their profile, you also get some early answers to important questions, but there are no guarantees there. You're still going to have to go through all of the work of really seeing if the relationship makes sense and then putting in the work to build that relationship into something significant, with all of the joys and difficulties that will bring.

      As for the income thing, match equates "don't want to answer" with "less than $25k/year". My wife didn't want to date the unemployed and put "at least $25k/year" as a filter and only saw me because I had recently made my income visible. So my wife wasn't being a gold-digger, but wouldn't have seen me if I hadn't put my income out there. Match.com's decision-making on this question is particularly questionable.

      Regards,
      Ross

  10. Oblig. by Mister+Impressive · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yeah, but 72% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

    --
    Let the commencement BEGINULATE!
  11. Not quite surprised here by tftp · · Score: 5, Funny
    No wonder geeks do not get much of replies. The very fact that a geek is sitting in his fortress, behind the flickering terminal, surrounded by 16 different and very old Linux boxen, clearly indicates that his romantic needs are best addressed by a robot or by some pr0n that is plentiful out there.

    And from the other side of the equation, no sensible female of the species will choose to date a geek that is clearly ill-adapted socially, is not likely to resemble a movie star from her wall poster, and probably will not fare well in the salary department if he ever manages to leave his basement (many choose not to.)

    And with respect to children, many men dislike children and don't want them at all. They are expensive to maintain, and pointless to raise in the first place. The society changed so much in the last 100-200 years that a large family that was a great advantage to a peasant is now a death warrant in many professional areas, financially and time-wise. Parents nowadays are expected to sink up to a million dollars into a child, with no ROI whatsoever. The parents become slaves to their children, working most of their productive life to maintain the family.

    1. Re:Not quite surprised here by Frogbert · · Score: 3, Funny

      Wow... just wow.

      I give that one +1 Jaded as Fuck.

    2. Re:Not quite surprised here by ceoyoyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Nah, give that one very young and hasn't figured out there's more to life than return on investment.

    3. Re:Not quite surprised here by CosmeticLobotamy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you'rea nerd you tend to look at things (everything) logically, if you take that approach to having children, there really is no logical reason to do so in this day and age.

      If you can say that, then you can say there's no logical reason to have sex or play baseball or create wealth. Some people want kids, others don't. There's no logic there. There's logic in not having them if you can't afford them, but that's pretty much it, I think.

    4. Re:Not quite surprised here by Aris+Katsaris · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you take emotion out of the equation, then there's no point in doing anything at all, given how happiness and unhappiness, satisfaction and dissatisfaction, are all emotions. Being inert as a rock is logical when there's no boredom or other emotion to make you desire activity -- letting civilization collapse is as "logical" as the opposite, when there's no emotion that makes one desire its continuation. Logic is only a method used to achieve end goals you've already set; logic is absolutely meaningless without *emotion* first setting what those goals should be.

    5. Re:Not quite surprised here by BeeBeard · · Score: 3, Funny

      I think you just made Spock's head explode!

  12. Women love a man with a huge... by Belial6 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Of course, women love a man with a huge... bank account. Did this suprise you?

    1. Re:Women love a man with a huge... by bmo · · Score: 4, Funny

      And men love women with huge....tracts of land!

      --
      BMO

    2. Re:Women love a man with a huge... by lubricated · · Score: 3, Funny

      They love men that don't realize that it was a Mony Python quote even more.

      --
      It has been statistically shown that helmets increase the risk of head injury.
  13. Geographical distance by Denial93 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I cannot believe geographical distance wasn't a factor. Who is going to date someone a two hours drive away? Then again, ignoring this probably helped in making the number of messages sent the best predictor for number of messages received, giving more false hope to quicktyping nerds. Bet the author was one.

    --
    blow your mind already
    1. Re:Geographical distance by Andrewkov · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Women love long-distance relationships. All talking and no sex.

  14. Re:Surprise Surprise by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Interestingly enough, my *nix instructor lives with his mom (who happens to be the SQL instructor).

    Yes, I'm a coward.

  15. okcupid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    For what it's worth (and I imagine it's worth a lot to slashdot readers), my experiences with online dating have always been best with okcupid. It is free, novel (fun matching tests), and its participants always seem, to me, to be more appealing than those of eharmony, match.com, and all the other paysites.

    1. Re:okcupid by radtea · · Score: 3, Informative

      For what it's worth (and I imagine it's worth a lot to slashdot readers), my experiences with online dating have always been best with okcupid.

      I've found the free sites generally better than the pay sites, too. Never met anyone from okcupid, but I met my current g/f on PlentyOfFish, and met a previous g/f there as well.

      In about three years of online dating I've observed that:

      1) Almost everyone lies, generally about age, appearance and relationship history. Lieing about appearance is the one that I haven't been able to make sense of. I've observed it myself in women, and according to many women I've dated lots of men do it too. One women described a guy she met as being, relative to his online picture, like the "before and after" of some terrible and ravaging disease. Lieing is a showstopper for me, so I have tended to drop a lot of women gently after a first meeting.

      2) Even on the really skanky sites, women are either looking for a relationship or are really messed up. I've never dated anyone from such sites, but poked around out of curiousity. Really.

      3) Free sites are better than pay sites. Lavalife is the best pay site I've used.

      4) Different sites have different geographic representations. I live in a small town, and some sites have far more women in my area than others. I have no idea why.

      5) By far the best strategy is to "meet early, meet often." After a couple of e-mail exchanges I ask if she wants to meet for coffee somewhere. If not, that's the end of it--life is too short to waste time on electronic interaction when five minutes face-to-face will tell you more than five months online.

      Overall, online dating is a very good thing if people go into with reasonable expectations and treat it as an introduction service rather than a magic filter that will find them "the One" without any hard relationship-building work on their part.

      --
      Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
  16. Depends where you are located by LilGuy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've had much success with "internet dating", but it seems to depend on where I live. When I lived in Houston the girls were plentiful and fun. Living in Des Moines is a completely different story. The only ones I get replies from here are trollish freaks that probably couldn't get a date if they didn't post fake pictures of some model, or at least some hot chick from down the street. I'm still amazed at the enormous differences in both quality and quantity of women from the online world between the two cities.

    --

    You're nothing; like me.
  17. Please date me!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hello, im a desprate virgin tieered of masterbating to videos of other people having sex. I spend all day at the computer, and i need someone to cook my food, do my laundry, and clean the house, as i have just moved out of my moms basement. I also require you to do all of this in sexy outfits, and have sex with me whevere i want, further, no naging is allowed, or i will reprogram you in the basement

    Please resond this time HotWifeWannabe1337!!, you dident seem to get my first 26 messages...

    -- Anoymous Coward

  18. Primitive? by kahei · · Score: 4, Insightful


    What's 'primitive' about dating? You think they have or had 'dating' in primitive societies? Modern Western culture, and those parts of the rest of the world that have been globalized into it, are the only places we find this custom. They didn't 'date' in Europe/America in the 1900s, and they don't 'date' in most of the world now, except for that internationalized overclass that you get in big cities.

    They have lots of sex, but that's a whole nuther thing.

    Enjoy the sophisticated, rarefied culture that allows you to have such esoteric customs as dating! But don't think it's a basic primitive instinctive thing, because it's about as natural to human culture as the iPod.

    --
    Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
  19. Members... by Savage-Rabbit · · Score: 3, Funny
    "Members" are anyone who'se ever signed on for an account and not deleted it....

    That is just plain wrong. Members (Latin name: Phallus Maximus) are sentient symbiont life-forms that human males carry between their legs. The member is connected to the brain of the human male and takes over control of the brain and thus the entire body whenever a human female is present manipulating the human male into to doing and saying idiotic things he would otherwise never dream of. Members, and the effect they have upon the behavior, utterances and personality of the human male can be quite annoying but unfortunately they can also not be eradicated since they are essential to the procreation of the species. Research into alternative technologies such as cloning is ongoing.
    --
    Only to idiots, are orders laws.
    -- Henning von Tresckow
  20. Qualities in a woman by threaded · · Score: 5, Funny

    When I was 14, I hoped that one day I would have a girlfriend. When I was 16 I got a girlfriend, but there was no passion, so I decided I needed a passionate girl with a zest for life.

    In college I dated a passionate girl, but she was too emotional. Everything was an emergency; she was a drama queen, cried all the time and threatened suicide. So I decided I needed a girl with stability.

    When I was 25 I found a very stable girl but she was boring. She was totally predictable and never got excited about anything. Life became so dull that I decided that I needed a girl with some excitement.

    When I was 28 I found an exciting girl, but I couldn't keep up with her. She rushed from one thing to another, never settling on anything. She did mad impetuous things and made me miserable as often as happy. She was great fun initially and very energetic, but directionless. So I decided to find a girl with some real ambition.

    When I turned 31, I found a smart ambitious girl with her feet planted firmly on the ground and married her. She was so ambitious that she divorced me and took everything I owned.

    Now, I am older and wiser, and am looking for a girl with big tits.

    --

    threadeds blog

  21. and men love a woman.... by cara · · Score: 3, Informative

    ...who is attractive. No surprise there.

    from grandparent post:
    From my limited experience on Match, I think the most important thing women were looking for was income range. I initially had that on my profile and got swamped with replies, after hiding that bit they slowed way down.

    As a woman I can make a reciprocol evaluation: From my experience, the most important thing men were looking for was looks. I initially had a photo up and got swamped with replies, after removing the photo they slowed way down.

  22. That chat room you speak of... by way2trivial · · Score: 4, Funny

    this chick
    http://www.tshirthell.com/images/contestpics/a249_ 004.jpg

    and this chick
    http://www.tshirthell.com/images/contestpics/a249_ 003.jpg

    the reason they didn't write back was they already finished spanking it for that evening...

    --
    every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
  23. Top Criteria by CrazyTalk · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Having done online dating in the past my top criteria was religion - not what religion they were following per se, but what religion they were looking for. "Catholics seeking Catholics" seemed to be the most common requirment in my area on match.com. As someone who is Jewish, albeit barely practicing, I was forced to skip these profiles over. What really irked me were profiles seeking a "Christian, Muslim, Taoist, Atheist" etc. and they had to go out of their way to de-select the option of dating someone who was Jewish, rather than just select "All religions"

  24. What kids may turn out to be good for by Slayer · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Kids are frequently portayed as a cost factor with no ROI whatsoever. I can tell you otherwise. I have seen many old people in retirement homes and see a huge difference between those who have a family and those who don't.

    Those with no kids often have nobody, who

    - looks after their well being (nurses and doctors are often overworked and do not notice health problems until it is too late)

    - visits them regularly. You can immediately spot people who haven't seen friends or relatives in a long time, they are often highly depressed and apathetic.

    - can take care of them so they stay out of retirement homes as long as possible. You will find that most people in retirement homes are folks with no family. Most of them could survive easily in their own house if someone cared for them properly.

    - really takes the time to understand their needs. Nobody knows your parents like you do. Nurses don't have the time to find out what you want if you can't talk after a heart attack ...

    - gives you love and comfort if you are sick and/or dying. You can't pay for that.

    Remember, that you spend many years being old and fragile, dependent on help. And at that age you don't look like an actor anymore, so most other people won't care about you. You can't take for granted that you kids will care about you, but from what I've seen, if you were a good parent, they will.

  25. Objects by GoatMonkey2112 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Don't waste your time dating primatives. Full fledged objects make much better dates.