Purpose
I was on my bed swiping away on the dating app called Tinder. With more than 400 matches I thought to myself: Do people who use online dating apps even meet up with their matches? After just a year of using online dating apps, I realized that I’ve only met up with 3 people. I wonder if it was just my luck or if everyone has the same experience as I do! I conducted a ten question survey, in which 25 people responded to these questions. The ten questions targeted people whose ages ranged from 18 to 24, questioning whether or not they meet up with their online matches. The motive behind this survey is to find an explanation about whether or not online dating app users meet up with their matches? And if not, why?
Surprising Findings
After reviewing the 25 respondents submission, I was shocked to find out that the majority of the people usually do not meet up with their matches. Not a single person meets up with all of the people that they match with. I learned that people usually do not meet up with their matches because they either feel unsafe or because their matches do not respond to them. This survey has taught me that online dating is harder than it seems to be because people do not take dating apps seriously or put no effort in trying.
Where is Chemistry?
As it turns out, looks aren’t everything! This is not rocket science and it doesn’t take a genius to come to this conclusion either! The majority of the time, people who do get a response from their match claims that there is no chemistry besides the physical attraction. According to my survey in the image above, more than half the responses say that they have no chemistry with their matches because the conversation often leads to ghosting. As a result of the lack of connection, the possibilities of meeting up become slimmer. In the Washington Post article called, “5 reasons people message on dating apps but never meet up” by Lane Moore discusses how texting boring conversations leads to a waste of time. There is also a consensus that people struggle with chemistry in my survey. Nobody on online dating apps is looking for Penpals, and nobody wants their time to be wasted either.
Insecurity
Everyone deals with insecurities in their time. One of the questions I asked on my survey was “Do you feel insecure about the way you look?” This is a factor which helped me answer why people don’t usually meet up with their match. One of the reasons why I back down from meeting a match is because I was lacking self-confidence. I wanted to know if this is a potential factor as to why people don’t usually meet up with their match. As can be seen in the images provided above, more than half of the people who use online dating apps said that they are self-conscious and it keeps them from meeting with their matches. It was most shocking to me that more guys than girls said that their insecurity prevents them from having the courage to go on a date. From the same article by Lane Moore, she explains insecurity through online dating further in depth. She shares that she’s insecure of her height and is afraid of what her match would think of her. This is prevalent to my question because even if it’s hard to admit, people usually don’t put themselves out into the dating world if they do not feel confident in themselves. The short scenario that Moore shares in her article are raw and this problem is very real with most people who use online dating.
Safety
Safety is one of the many reasons why people don’t meet with their matches on dating apps. Safety and trust are key to any relationship and is even more important when you plan on meeting with a complete stranger through a dating app. One of the questions I asked in my survey is, “Do you feel safe meeting up with people you match with in person? As a result, 36% of the people voted maybe, 32% voted no, and 32% voted yes. In retrospect, it seems like more than half of the people I surveyed felt uncertainty about their safety when meeting with a potential partner.
Conclusion
After conducting this survey, I realized that there are many factors that stunt people from meeting their match in person. People usually do not meet with their matches due to chemistry, insecurity, and safety. This taught me that not only does the app can improve for the users, and it also explained why people may be hesitant to meet up with their matches. This survey led me to another question: Should dating apps include features to improve safety for users? — something I didn’t think much of before.
Works Cited
“Match. Chat. Date.” Tinder, tinder.com/.
Moore, Lane. “5 Reasons People Message on Dating Apps but Never Meet Up.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 8 Oct. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/news/soloish/wp/2018/10/08/5-reasons-people-message-on-dating-apps-but-never-meet-up/?utm_term=.c371119c5e7f.
