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An Evidence-Based Approach To Online Dating
HughPickens.com writes Rachel Nuwer writes in the NYT that Dr. Sameer Chaudhry's online dating persona was garnering no response from the women he reached out to so he synthesized 86 literature studies on the subject of online dating in the fields of psychology, sociology, and computer, behavioral, and neurocognitive sciences.in hopes of improving his odds. As it turns out, success begins with picking a user name. While men are drawn to names linked to physical traits (e.g., Cutie), the researchers found, women prefer ones that indicate intelligence (e.g., Cultured). Both sexes respond well to playful names (e.g. Fun2bwith) and shy away from ones with negative connotations (e.g., Bugg). User names that begin with letters from the first half of the alphabet do better than those from the latter half. "As human beings, we have a tendency to give things at the top of a pile more value," says Khan. As for your profile photo, pick a photo with a genuine smile, one that crinkles the eyes, and with a slight head tilt (it's linked to attractiveness). And if you're looking for a male partner, go for that photo of you in siren red—a color that enhances men's attraction to women. "For those attracted to browse into the profile, a description of personal traits increased likeability when it: showed who the dater was and what they were looking for in a 70:30 ratio; stayed close to reality; and employed simple language with humor added. Invitations were most successful in obtaining a response from the potential date when they: were short personalized messages addressing a trait in their profile; rhymed with their screen name or headline message; and extended genuine compliments." And finally, don't wait too long before arranging a face to face meeting.
So in other words, restrict your dating into a strict, stressful, desperate, calculated operation?
Is this for a fuck or a life partner?
Do not spend your time synthesizing literature studies.
He should have just gone for an arranged marriage.
Thank you, Thank you.
I do not know how to thank you enough for this advice, I am going to make use of it from now on.
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
From the title, I thought someone would have tried to compile all of this info in a bot who would use machine learning to find the potential matches.
Don't you know it is now both immoral and criminal to think beyond the next quarterly report?
He didn't write 86 studies. To quote the article:
The two combed through all of the scientific literature on the topic that they could find. They eventually settled on 86 studies that focused on factors that seem to transform computer-mediated interactions into real-world dates.
Anyone who follows this advice deserves what they get.
The age old advice still stands: be yourself.
If someone wants you for who you're not, rather than who you are, you are better off just moving on. Here's what I posted on my blog years ago after marrying a wonderful woman I met on Plenty of Fish:
I was recently reading the front page of plentyoffish.com, a dating web site where my wife and I first met (we recreated a joint account to submit a testimonial), that provided a very long, detailed opinion piece to a young man about how to behave in order to win a girl that he was very attracted to. It was from a so-called dating expert, and contained some of the worst drivel that men cling to in hopes of landing a wife.
The given advice was to act distant, indifferent, and aloof; that showering her with affection made him look desperate and goofy. We men turn to this kind of garbage when we're not having much luck with women. We turn to this crap when we actually do become desperate.
It took me a long time to realize what should have been self-evident all along: the old advice of just being yourself is, by far, the best advice you could possibly get. Being yourself isn't intended to improve upon the quantity of women you attract. It is intended to improve upon the quality of women you attract. Not surprisingly, the exact same advice applies equally to women. Don't follow those stupid "rules" such as not making the first move. All those rules are complete and utter crap, and will just make you even more miserable than you already are.
All the little head games and misdirections that you have learned are intended to achieve one thing: a brief relationship. They are not the doorway to a lasting marriage, but rather just the path to multiple meaningless disappointments. You will not be able to maintain the charade you have built, and will always fail in the long run. She will always see through you eventually. You will eventually slip up and expose yourself for the fraud you are, and you will be back to square one.
If she is not interested in who you really are, then you do not want her (regardless of what your hormones may tell you). It doesn't matter how pretty, gorgeous, sexy, or otherwise desirable she may seem. If she is not attracted to who and what you are, then any meaningful relationship with her is doomed. She will eventually (but usually quickly) tire of you, and move on to the next guy.
I am a software developer, and spend most of my time in front of a computer. When I was dating, I tried hard to hide that from my dates. All the advice I had been given was that women were turned off by the kind of geeky guy who spent that much time with his computer. I tried to list other interests on the dating site (tenuous as those interests were), tried focusing on what I thought women wanted, and every other trick I could think of that was even remotely true (and some that were very much not true when I reached a certain point of disillusion). Maintaining the illusion was very difficult, as that isn't who I am.
In the end, it was those very traits that my wife tells me were the most attractive to her. It turns out that her life had been full of too much stress, anxiety, and drama. An easy-going, caring, intelligent, homebody of a man is exactly what she had been looking for, and couldn't find, for a very long time (we were both in our late 30's). She would not have been at all interested in the man I had tried pretending to be, but was hopelessly in love with the man I actually am. Who we really are is what allows us to connect on a very deep, lasting level.
It took us both a very long time to find each other (strictly speaking, she found me), and we both suffered some horrible emotional scarring in our prior lives apart, but that scarring is what allowed us to appreciate what we have together.
So although it may hurt in the short term, it's better to be rejected by women for who you are than to be accepted by women for who you are not. You will eventually find that woman who will love you for who you are, even if you have to go through many painful rejections along the way. The women who accept you for who they want you to be will always desert you. No exceptions.
Lots of desperate womens self-help mags - check
Lots and lots of candy - no
You call this a check out line?
Looks
If you have that you won't need anything else to get replies
Sounds like a match...
# touch universe # chmod +rwx universe #
You are somehow similar to the potential partner. Looks like a good start.
Rule #2. Just don't do online dating. Even if you can improve your odds from 1 in 100 to 2 in 100...is that really worth the effort?
This was silly; "evidence based" would have shown that, if you are looking online for dating, you are a loser. End of story. The good ones are already in a relationship or don't need to go online to find a date. So sure, maybe these techniques help you look like the best loser.
I perfunctorily looked at TFA, and it doesn't mention height at all. This is ridiculous, and any man with even the most basic experience with online dating knows that height is perhaps the most important number in your online profile. The higher that number is, the more likely one is to receive invitations from women. I actually made an experiment, once, where I created to fake profiles that were almost identical, except for height, and the profile that had a height 10 cm larger than the other, got about 40 TIMES more contact requests (175 cm vs. 190 cm).
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
The age old advice still stands: be yourself.
Certainly, but most people want to make a good first impression. And most people here are willing to study how to do that. Or are you suggesting that people here should not be true to themselves, that in this special case they should go with their gut instead of studying and learning from more knowledgeable people like they would any other issue?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
What I'm most confused about these days is how, when engaging in online dating, the two people involved determine the actual gender of the other.
During our Christmas family gathering, my nephew (who is attending college) was explaining to me and my wife about how gender is no longer binary. Apparently there aren't just "males" and "females". There are some people who have a male body, but they identify as being female, and vice versa. Some people even identify as not having any gender, or having both genders sometimes, or even both genders all of the time. Apparently some people even consider their gender to be dog or cat or some other animal! Modern medical and surgical techniques now make it possible for people to change their physical gender traits almost at will. Women can physically become men, and men and physically become women.
Me and my wife came from a simpler time, when you could tell somebody's gender based on their genitalia. If you needed confirmation, you'd ask them to remove their pants and underwear, and you could observe for yourself what their genitalia was like. If you saw a penis, you were dealing with a man. If you saw a vulva then you were dealing with a woman. But based on what my nephew said, it does not sound that simple these days!
So when one engages in online dating, how does one know the actual gender of the people they are dealing with? Somebody may claim to be a woman, and may even look like a woman in photos, but under their pants would be a penis, or what's left of a penis that was surgically converted into a vagina. If you are a man looking for a woman, how would you guarantee that the person you're looking at the profile of is actually a woman, and has always been a woman? If you are a man who is looking for a woman who used to be a man, how would you guarantee that the person you're looking at the profile of is actually a man who was physically altered to become a woman?
Women are generally bad news in the long term.
This doesn't mean they are not useful for sex, but they can
and will RUIN your life financially if you buy into the whole
"get married, have kids," routine. Why ? Because the divorce
rate is skyrocketing and you will end up paying child support
and alimony while you get to visit your kids a few times a
month.
Marriage is for chumps and suckers. Ask any divorced man whether
he would do the same thing he did in the past, knowing what he knows
now. You'd better be ready for a strong dose of reality if he decides to
give you an honest answer.
Marriage is a con game perpetrated by women on men. Smart men don't
fall into the trap.
captcha = families ( you've got to be fucking kidding me, you Slashfucks )
If you need an overnight relationship it does not really matter, as long as it fits the need. If you look for a long, probably lifelong one, you generally get to know a lot more for the other person, besides the tiny gender issues. And no, you did not come from the simpler time. You just had luck. These gender uncertainities are in no way new.
...you could just ask someone out that you meet in person, thus avoiding all of this investment of time and effort before you even know that there's going to be a basic mutual attraction. You're going to have to interact face-to-face eventually anyway.
Anyone who thinks this is a good idea should read: http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Ro... Possibly the funniest read I've ever had, especially as I saw elements of myself in his character... Oh and if you thinks it's a bad idea I still recommend the book.
I am diagnosed autistic, balding, stack shelves for a living, have a huge comics web site and my favorite topic is tax reform. But I am also 6 foot 6. So I was never short of dates on OKCupid.
(All of that is true BTW)
And I am currently engaged to the most wonderful woman in the world, thanks to the aforementioned site: She is beautiful, sexy, intelligent, capable, funny, incredibly kind, etc. and was only single because people found her own height intimidating (she is north of 6 foot). She replied to my initial contact specifically because of my height. Since then we found other things in common, but not until the 2nd or 3rd email.
So is height one of the top reasons for dating? HELL YES.
I bet this guy get's all the chicks... In theory.
wait what? Is that a thing people do?
So keen for online dating as well
In other words, don't be yourself, try to be something you are not in order to attract someone who then hopefully will be willing to settle when they find out who you really are. Brilliant! Just start the whole relationship on the basis of deception.
This works great in business. You get somebody hooked on your product with a bunch of promises and by the time they find out they are too deep in to back out. Not sure how well it works in relationships. Oh, wait, the divorce rate continues to rise even though there is a huge jump in the number of couples living together and not getting married at all. Huh, I guess founding your relationship on a lie is a bad idea after all.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Because
> women prefer ones that indicate intelligence
Hah.
Wait until the internet can convey smell. Until then is a lottery. But you can try a lot of dates, which will probably help you:
a) find a woman (not necessarily the one who better matches you);
b) find a bug (possibly the one which perfectly matches you).
you forgot to rhyme. the article said it is important however depending on your username it can sometimes be hard
The evidence shows that the modern world is a woman's world.
No angelic cute young girls for any man. The competition doesn't like it.
None of this bullshit is going to change that. A revolution could.
Age of marriage used to be 9 even in Delaware before the women's movement of the mid to late 19th century. It was that since the dawn of time till women gained influence.
Deuteronomy 22 28-29 in hebrew allows men to rape young girls (yes children), and keep them as brides, must pay father though.
This is the worst crime in modern feminist police states, but fine by the God of Deuteronomy, provided the girl wasn't owned by someone else allready.
Actually had to turn down a few because people there just want fuck buddies for the most part, but I met a really nice HS teacher and we've kept in touch since. My user name started with a B btw.
I met my wife online some 12 years ago, our 10th anniversary is in June. Prior to her I had mixed results with online dating, I followed the 'to thine own self be true' model and had a very honest profile. I think that my takeaway from my experience was that it takes time and doesn't give instant results. My wife found me: I lived 500 miles away from her at the time and wasn't searching that broad a radius, she was running in to little but ignorant rednecks and broadened her search radius, finding me. It looks to me like you can keep your profile honest by following the FA's advice, you're just optimizing a bit to try to improve results. If I were looking, I'd definitely give it some serious consideration.
I'm definitely forwarding this to a friend who lost his wife a bit over a year ago and hasn't been having much luck with online dating.
When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
Why -1?
WHY -1?!
FUCK YOU FEMINIST PIECES OF TRASH.
Filter error: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.
Filter error: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.
Anyone who follows this advice deserves what they get.
The age old advice still stands: be yourself.
There is nothing in this article recommending what to lie about or how to trick someone into dating you. It is about how to put your best foot forward online. It is no different than telling someone to dress nice when you first meet someone or don't talk about yourself too much on a first date.
It has advice like "ask open questions", "respond promptly", "introduce humor", "do smile", "pay genuine compliments", etc. Oh how manipulative these recommendations are!
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
wait what? Is that a thing people do?
Makes it easier to remember. If they don't remember your chances go downward.
I disagree with that, there's plenty of people that aren't losers that are using online dating sites. Why should I have to waste all those hours looking for people that _might_ be single and then have to worry about not just convincing them to give me a number, but then have to worry about how many deal breakers there might be left to resolve.
If anything, I'd suggest that it's mainly losers that do this the traditional way. People that don't understand efficiency and are willing to settle because they might not find anybody that's going to meet their expectations. At least with online dating, you often times can avoid spending a great deal of time on something that's clearly not going to work out.
In other words, people searching for a mate are looking for someone who is honest, makes them laugh, shares their interests and isn't an asshole.
Soon to be published in the Obviousman Journal of No-Shit Sherlock Studies.
So I check it and reload the page. They have logged me out. If I choose to disable ads, I get logged out.
I log back in, check disable ads again. Now the site is "error 503". Same page I was just looking at, no longer available.
What a lovely way to run a techy website.
AntDude is a turn off? :(
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
What you do isn't likely to be a draw unless it is exotic, either by virtue of rarity, or by virtue of publicly visible achievement (CEO of a major company, etc.)
Who you are, on the other hand, is something you demonstrate with everything you do. Worthwhile women (as opposed to self-destructive barflies and NASCAR fans) are most often looking for several things, usually in the following order.
First, looks and character. You don't have to be a beautiful man, but you will do best if you carry yourself with confidence, and no matter what you should be clean and smell good or at least not smell bad, you need to groom your hair, keep your fingernails and sweaty parts extremely clean without telegraphing obsession, and you should dress like someone who can afford to dress well, because...
Second, security. You should project the sense that being with you is a better state than being without you. A nice car, a nice ring or watch, clean clothes in excellent shape, these send two messages: that you will spend for comfort and that you can spend. Most women of breeding age (even if you're not interested in having kids, I assume you're still interested in going through the motions) are looking for a fellow who is able and willing to make that nest. That's true even if they say, and if they really mean, they don't want kids themselves. Security is a very good thing, and they've been seriously tuned up by evolution to seek it out. Also, as a life goal, a great nest is an excellent thing to aim for, to achieve, and to share.
On the subject of security, kill any debt you have if humanly possible. You'll have more money in the end. A debt-free person is a lot more attractive than one who brings such things to a relationship. This isn't always achievable, but if you can get out of debt and/or avoid it entirely, you definitely should. Financial rule #1: You don't want to pay interest. You want to charge interest.
Once you are interacting, STFU and listen. You can initiate conversations, and steer them, and you should, but you need to be a good listener more than anything else. Let her speak and encourage her to speak more, and visibly enjoy the experience (don't fake it -- build a mindset where you are interested. It's entirely a good thing.) The time for you to speak at any length is when you are asked a question. Which you answer carefully and in the most interesting way you can. Otherwise, short and sweet is the rule. This aids in making you intriguing and in projecting interest in her.
I speak from a lifetime of experience, and a great deal of success in courting the women I went after, ultimately, finding and keeping someone of such profound worth and compatibility that to this day, after decades, I am still deeply in love with her, and she with me. I'm almost 60, BTW. And yes, I am an engineer and a geek, and I am not a beautiful man. However I am confident and I am extroverted but can listen well without having to interrupt with my own take or story (one of the most obnoxious conversational failures ever, IMHO, is to interrupt, or answer, a story of someone else's with a recitation of something similar or related that happened to you. Instead, ask questions about the story and as it is told, respond to it within its own context. You can take that one right to the relationship bank. No matter how strong the urge, don't tell stories about yourself except when explicitly asked to do so. Mystery trumps bragging every time.)
When the day comes when you're trying to seriously figure out if a particular lady is "the one", watch out for serious areas of conflict that the rush of romance has (temporarily, I assure you) pushed aside: religion, politics, impingement of extended family fuckarosis, drinking or drugging habits and seriously divergent philosophical outloo
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
...or ask for a date too early. ;)
And different women have different dating time requirements. Good luck!
If you're a man and want to attract a woman:
Be rich.
Be attractive.
Be an asshole.
Lie.
If you're a woman and want to attract a man:
Be alive and willing to fuck.
Don't be an asshole.
Lie.
Simply because:
1) They all have ON/OFF buttons. That comes in handy every once in a while.
2) If they get an attitude problem RESET fixes it.
3) Made in USA is good, Made in China is better.
4) They play some of the best music, videos (Especially Lord of the Rings) and you know, they love it!
5) They provide excellent feed back on my code. If it sucks they let me know.
6) Excellent life partner and teacher. It seems she knows everything.
7) Even when she gets old I can upgrade.
Yeah, Asian women. Love'em.
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
> great ego booster
She gets it. Whenever I feel down, I login and then I feel better.
This research appears to start from the position that generating a huge volume of matches is a good thing. It depends what you're looking for: if you want a bit of fun, that's probably a valid assumption. If you're looking for the ideal long-term partner it's absolutely the wrong assumption. There's no point wasting your time on the no-hopers; instead, you should approach the problem a bit like an employer placing a job advert: ideally you want a small number of very good applicants. One response that meets your requirements will do; a couple more gives you a bit of room for picking the best one.
I'm not sure it changes the outcome much, except maybe don't feel bound to use simple language in your profile unless you're looking for Jessica Simpson, but the approach you take to your profile should always be based on what you're looking for.
Posting Anon for obvious reasons.
I've done extensive online dating. I've read a LOT about it. I've made dozens of profiles, including female profiles to figure out how other men do it and several fake profiles with stock photo profile pictures to understand how the picture influences the responses.
The first lesson I learnt is that women online are exactly the same as they are offline. If you're a prince, they will fall into your arms (one of my fake profiles didn't send a single message to any girl, but it got plenty of conversation initiations, on a site where other profiles got zero initial messages and a 10-15% response rate). If you're normal, they expect you to come to them.
The second lesson I learnt is that women will filter out aggressively, and not respond if they are not interested, simply because they get 100 mails every day and that's no exaggeration. If you are bored and lonely and like to read how people make fools of themselves, make a fake profile with scantly clad pictures of a gorgeous woman and hint (but don't explicitly say it) at mainly sexual interest. Your inbox will explode.
The third lesson is that most of your competition actually sucks. Badly. I've seen what men write to women in my fake profiles and it made me cringe. Grammatically correct, complete sentences with discernible content are enough to elevate you into the top 10%. That'll still get you 10-20% response rates because women are looking for the top 1%, but at least you're in range.
Finally no matter what any coach or bullshit "just be yourself" advice or any "tune your profile" service tries to tell you, online dating is mostly a numbers game. You will get x% of response rate. y% of conversations will turn into first dates. z% of first dates will turn into something more.
Sure, you can tune the x, y and z values, and if they're really low you should. But once you're out of the single digits, raising the amount of input will result in more gain in output than tuning those numbers.
Let's start out by saying I have grown children. 15 or so years ago, you could meet people. Now.... not so much.
Half a dozen years or so ago, I went on several sites, including craiglist and match. I said that I was looking for someone *over* 40.
And I got... a bunch of responses, claiming to be from women who were allegedly between 21 and 26. And claiming they'd read my profile.
Right. I think I found *one* woman who actually existed, and went on a date or two. The rest... as I said, in annoyance, to several, "no, you're not; you're a fat 47 yr old guy claiming to be a hot woman, the kind you'd like to date, but who will never give you a first glance, and you're trying to make money out of this. Unfuck off.
mark "and added them to my killfile"
Women do like engineers. Engineer = stable + money. You've not found dating success which has given you a negative attitude, and unfortunately, the negative attitude will further hurt your chances. Women also kind of like men that they enjoy being around.
I am not personally an engineer, but I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, so I will provide you with an algorithm for dating so that you know how it's done.
1. Find female human that is attractive to you. Where you find her is unimportant. Maybe it is at work or standing inline or at a singles function or online. Or maybe someplace else. Who cares?
2. Smile and strike up a short conversation with her about something you suspect you might share a mutual interest in. Context should give you an idea. If you're in line at the grocery store, you could ask her how she likes that particular brand of health pellets that she has in her cart. If it's online, something from her profile that you also like. That type of context.
IF (she isn't trying to escape the conversation && she doesn't say anything that disqualifies herself) {
Ask for her number. (if she says no, don't throw a tantrum.)
} ELSE {
close out the conversation gracefully
GOTO 1
}
3. Call that evening and ask her out on a short get-together (coffee, a walk through the park, something low-commitment)
4. During the get-together, see how the conversation flows and how you both are enjoying each other.
IF (she doesn't appear to be trying to escape ASAP && you are enjoying your time with her) {
Ask her out on a more substantial date and/or try to hook up with her
} ELSE {
Gracefully tell her that you had a great time but that you don't see any further dates in the future or just do the "Fade away" (i.e. don't call her anymore).
GOTO 1
}
Hopefully you can take it from here.
By the way, you should be asking out a lot of chicks while you're single, and definitely should be executing this pseudocode in parallel until you're exclusive with anyone.
Good luck!
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
I'm kind of blown away by the responses to this blurb. It sounds like there are a lot of really boring, shallow women out there. Same goes for dudes, sadly. But a common thread I keep seeing in the posts is that many of you feel like all women care about is your salaries, but that many of them are so classless and unrefined as to be undeserving.
I guess I'm pretty lucky to live in Seattle where if you asked anyone about NASCAR they would ask you what sort of IT-related acronym to which you are referring.
Maybe there's something else you might want to look for. Let me explain.
Having been called a unicorn by a good dozen people, I can tell you that what I am interested in is someone who can engage in rapid-fire intellectual sparring/ verbal pachinko, matches my sense of humor (dark, dry, frequently absurd, referential), *and* is into being healthy and active--*as a baseline*. I would never ask my partner to make more of an effort here than I do (yeah, I'm looking at you, 100+-mile hikes, various marathons, and >10k-foot mountains). Of course there are some other things that are nice to have but not mandatory. I am bisexual, nonmonogamous, absolutely do not want kids ever, and make a pretty decent salary, especially for a generation in which many still live with their overly supportive parents. I feel that, as a woman, I have more or less found the cheat codes to life by choosing not to marry or have kids. I will never be dependent on anyone. I will never sacrifice my career, my sense of self, or my body to having kids or adopting. I can date people for the sheer pleasure of their company rather than ever needing to 'size them up' as a potential mate. I will never be dragged into isolating breeder hell in some generic suburb. I should not ever need to make excuses for not wanting kids, as it's my choice anyway.
There's a search variable on OKC that lets you search for women who don't want 'em either. It sounds like many of you are feeling exploited. Maybe you should search for women who don't want kids and have salaries of at least 60k to remedy this. And if that's not cutting it, you may want to look in the mirror.
Just my two cents. And good luck with the dating.
Read the book, Why Men Are the Way They Are by Warren Farrell.
Summary: Don't blame yourself for everything. Maybe your problems are at least partly due to the worsening dis-functionality of the entire U.S. culture.
I'm writing a book that provides far more detail, but it will be perhaps 2 years until my book is published.
Can you be any more disgusting?