1. Do young dating app users and non-users differ in mating orientations?
- Author
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Barrada JR, Castro Á, Fernández Del Río E, and Ramos-Villagrasa PJ
- Subjects
- Adolescent, Adult, Female, Humans, Interpersonal Relations, Love, Male, Sexual Behavior statistics & numerical data, Sexual Partners psychology, Single Person psychology, Spain, Students, Surveys and Questionnaires, Universities, Young Adult, Courtship psychology, Mobile Applications trends, Sexual Behavior psychology
- Abstract
In recent years, dating apps have changed the way people meet and communicate with potential romantic and/or sexual partners. There exists a stereotype considering that these apps are used only for casual sex, so those apps would not be an adequate resource to find a long-term relationship. The objective of this study was to analyze possible individual differences in the mating orientations (short-term vs. long-term) between users and non-users of dating apps. Participants were 902 single students from a mid-size Spanish university, of both sexes (63% female, and 37% male), aged between 18 and 26 years (M = 20.34, SD = 2.05), who completed a battery of online questionnaires. It was found that, whereas dating apps users had a higher short-term mating orientation than non-users (more frequent behavior, higher desire, and more positive attitude), there were no differences in the long-term orientation as a function of use/non-use. Considering this, dating apps are a resource with a strong presence of people interested on hooking-up while, simultaneously, not a bad (nor good) option for finding long-term love., Competing Interests: The authors declared that no competing interests exist.
- Published
- 2021
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