This is a factual article describing how daters misrepresent themselves online. Some mistruths are considered “small” and “acceptable,” for example, height, weight and age. When interviewing online daters and comparing their profiles to the actual numbers, women described themselves thinner in their profiles more often than men, however, men lied more about their height compared to women. People were most honest about age. Women’s photographs were older than men’s by a year.
The article discusses ethnic preferences while online dating.
Many scholars hypothesized dating online would break down ethnic barriers present in non-online dating, but research demonstrates a vast majority of online daters participate in homophily, the tendency of humans to date others who are similar to themselves, ethnically and otherwise. It notes white individuals are more likely to participate in homophily than black individuals. However, the majority of black individuals still participate in homophily. Older white women are most likely of all groups to participate in homophily. Most daters do not mention ethnic preferences online.
wanting to date people of their own ethnicity.
The article examines gender parity and how men and women have opposite preferences for things like physical attributes and income. Researchers found women prefer men who are slightly overweight, while men prefer women who are slightly underweight. The scholars found women have a stronger preference than men do for income over physical attributes.
Few daters were willing to express a political preference or interest in politics on their dating profiles. Scholars suspect this is because users were trying to attract as many dates as possible and politics can be extremely divisive.
Online daters were more likely to share they are overweight than share their political party preference.
This is a factual article providing a list of ten items most commonly lied about in online dating profiles and alternatives to these lies. The ten items most commonly lied about are: Height, Weight, Physique, Age, Income, Job Type, Lifestyle, Hobbies, Connections to Celebrities, and Photographs. This work combines information from two studies. The first is a study conducted by researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Cornell University. The second is commissioned by BeautifulPeople.com.
Height – Men are more than twice as likely to fib about their height than their female counterparts. A study from dating site OkCupid confirms taller men receive more messages. The same study shows shorter women get the attention, so it is ill-advised for women to pad their numbers.
Weight – The UW/Cornell study found women and men subtract 8.5 and 1.5 pounds, respectively, on average. Dating coach, Erika Ettin recommends skipping over the weight question, rather than being dishonest about weight. Instead, Ettin advises truthfully answering the body type question, which most sites ask with a dropdown menu of limited options like ‘slender’ and ‘stocky.’
Physique – The photos and activities portion of the user’s profile can give you a better idea of how “in shape” your online dater is. Women can miss potential daters by leaving this section blank and only selecting the “slender” body type option instead Ettin suggests the body type should match the pictures in order for online dating to be successful.
Age – One-third of men admit to lying about their age compared to seventeen percent of women. The highest percentage of liars erased or added a year or two. “Eventually you’re going to have to tell the truth,” Ettin says, so why bother lying?
Income – Greg Hodge of Beautifulpeople.com recommends subtracting forty percent from a man’s salary in their dating profile for accuracy. Men think it is more acceptable to lie about income than other elements. Ettin advises her clients not answer this question.
Job Type and Title – Forty two percent of men lie about some aspect of their job, while women are close behind at thirty two percent. Ettin encourages clients to tell the truth as you want someone who is in awe of what you actually do.
Lifestyle – Dr. Toma’s study found liars in this category will use fewer “I” statements. For example, someone might say, “Love to travel” rather than, “I love to travel.” It’s their way of distancing themselves from their lies as lying is cognitively taxing.