How are online dating apps like Tinder and Bumble changing how we approach dating?
I was recently talking to a group of friends and we were taking turns recalling stories about previous dates we had been on that ranged from sweet and funny to disastrous. Most of these dates had met online dating apps and it got me thinking: How are online dating apps like Tinder and Bumble changing how we approach dating?
Dating apps have added another dimension for people to find a partner or hook-up and originated in the gay community with the app Grindr launching in 2009. A couple of years later in 2012, Tinder was launched for people of all sexualities. Since then Tinder has particularly taken fire in the dating world. It’s a dating app for people where you can message whoever you swipe right on as long as they swipe right too. Making it a match. Men are nearly twice as likely to have Tinder than women. For heterosexual males in more cases than not they’ll also have to make the first move and message first. Tinder is also well known as the app you go to for hook-ups (Fetters 2018).
Dating apps can even be viewed as a game for users as its mechanics are very much like that of a game. Just keep swiping til you get a match. Take Bumble for example. It’s like Tinder in that you swipe right on people you like and left on people you don’t like. But in the heterosexual version, Bumble puts women in charge of messaging first when they match with a male. Only having 24 hours to do so before the match expires. It has also been mentioned that males tend to swipe on every girl simply to give them a better chance of matching and then deciding from there if they find the person attractive or not (Fetters 2018).
So, has dating become simply a game? It’s convenient and fast paced. There are studies which states how the buzz of notifications causes a spike in dopamine. So just imagine the high you can get from matching and being notified of potential dates or hook-ups (Karahassan 2016). On the other hand, two of Tinder’s founders Justin Mateen and Sean Rad said the inspiration behind Tinder revolved around their dissatisfaction with their own lack of dating opportunities. Dating apps provide you with a bigger pool of fellow singles, there are plenty of fish in the sea (Fetters 2018).
I understand that my question may change and how the finished product could be completely different to what I anticipated. Through research I have already come across so many different opinions, statistics and stories and I’m excited to see how through digital ethnography, further research and interviews I can contribute to this discussion.
References:
Fetters, A 2018, ‘The 5 years that changed dating’, The Atlantic, viewed 9th October 2019, .
Karahassan, P 2016, ‘How technology is changing dating’, Psychalive, viewed 9th October 2019, .
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