Why dating apps fail you?
Once your profile is live on a dating app, you see potential matches. Their picture, their name or handle name, and the profile parameters – age, occupation, height, etc. Their profile note describing themselves. And their location – distance from yours.
You begin swiping – right if you like, and left if you don’t.
A few reply, making it a ‘match’.
A few others express interest in you. You can make a match if you like, or ignore the requests.
You scrutinize the matches carefully. Check their social media profile and go through their profiles with greater interest.
You shortlist. One or more matches. And begin chatting.
You chat. Sometimes speak. For days, Weeks. Even months.
You date those you like. Meet virtually. Meet some in person as well.
You compare the person you meet against the picture you had been chatting with. You stay connected. Meet again, perhaps. If you are lucky, you find the match you are looking for. And your match too feels the same. It’s bliss.
You chat, speak, and date, like two people interested in having a romantic relationship.
Your attraction grows. But there are also red flags you discover.
A sarcastic comment or two. A lie. Or some info withheld from you. He doesn’t turn or call back and offers no excuse. She has mood swings. ‘Gosh! He seems so stuck up about certain things!’
On one side is growing attraction, and on the other is discomfort about things so inconsequential you can’t even speak to anyone about them.
You are confused.
Unsure, you return to the dating app. You want a choice. You begin swiping – right and left.
You repeat the process.
Suddenly you spot your romantic partner among the matches.
Dating apps are designed to build attraction based on features Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, author of Don’t Trust Your Gut, calls ‘shiny’. The eight most popular features users seek in potential matches are:
- Race/ethnicity
- Religious affiliation
- Height
- Occupation
- Physical attractiveness
- Previous marital status
- Sexual tastes
- Similarity to oneself
We are attracted to shiny features. Or, to potential matches with these shiny features.
Science proves the reasons that attract us to someone are not the same as those that would keep us together in a relationship.
What makes a relationship rock are certain character traits that couples have. If you and your romantic partner have those character traits, you are likely to have a great relationship. The rest, or the shiny features – personal likes and dislikes, personality, height, occupation, looks – don’t matter. At least not if you are trying to build a serious relationship.
Says Davidowitz, “If I had to sum up, in one sentence, the most important finding in the field of relationship science: In the dating market, people compete ferociously for mates with qualities that do not increase one’s chances of romantic happiness.”
Dating apps only focus on the shiny features. You see, you like, you chat, you meet, and then… continue or move on.
No wonder most people using apps find them exhausting. A common refrain: ‘They suck’.
Dating apps open options – they connect you to some of the best-looking people within striking distance. But to discover true compatibility, you have to labor yourself.
Keep trying – maybe you get lucky.
That’s what the dating apps want to do: keep you in there, swipe right, or left.
