Hating Dating Apps, But Needing Dating Apps
College students’ increasing dating app use during the pandemic
—By Melanie Lott
In the midst of an isolating pandemic that has worsened mental health and feelings of loneliness for many college students, the attention and flattery that received from profiles on a dating app is a high that may be unmatched. Dating apps like Tinder, Bumble, and Hinge were already a huge trend before COVID-19 and now, college students are using them even more. According to The Atlantic, dating apps originated within the gay community in the late 2000s with apps like Grindr and Scruff. In 2012, we were given Tinder and online dating participation started to increase among all Americans. That trend spread across college campuses, but with the start of the pandemic increasing isolation, usage has exploded.
Without opportunities to meet new matches at bars or parties, swiping is the only replacement. Although people are using dating apps to meet people during the pandemic, the social desire to meet people in person is still ever present, creating a strange contrast between action and thought for many students. According to the Huntington News, college students use dating apps simply because it’s their only option in the pandemic. However, they feel that it is significantly more difficult to feel a connection online without having physical intimacy or chemistry. Dating is very difficult in the pandemic because students have anxiety about and are aware of health risks of dating, but are basically desperate. Especially for students living in dorms, everyday social interactions are minimal and it’s even hard to simply make friends. College students are also using dating apps more purely because of boredom in the pandemic. Findings in both of these articles correlated with responses from several students at University of Michigan as they felt stuck in a situation of disliking using apps for the most part, but still using them all the time.
It’s An Addiction
The trend for college students to continue using apps, but also continuing to dislike them was extremely prevalent for these University of Michigan students. One University of Michigan senior, Alex (nonbinary, queer) mentioned the 2020 Netflix documentary, The Social Dilemma, had swayed them away from using dating apps ever again. The documentary shed light on how social media apps, like dating apps, were designed specifically to get you addicted so that big tech companies could store all of your data and sell to advertisers. Alex didn’t like that. Even though Alex had met their current partner from Bumble when they were sophomores, they had a lot of negative things to say about dating apps and felt ashamed for meeting their partner through one because it felt “less natural” to them. There was an obvious contradiction as Alex knew dating apps had helped them, but were ultimately bad for their conscious, “I think freshman year of college, I had huge, huge amounts of insecurity that the dating apps were feeding into and I was constantly obsessing over what pictures I was posting on there, whether or not I looked good in them, the words I was using on there… But then, it also alleviated some of that insecurity and I was getting people who were interested in me.” Alex felt addicted to swiping at one point because it gave them instant satisfaction and validation.
Another senior at U of M, Priscilla (woman, straight), described a similar attraction to dating apps and said she started using them specifically for validation and attention. She talked about apps like Tinder allowing you to make snap judgements based on physical attraction, making her feel superficial, but also giving her that “quick” validation that someone out there was attracted to her. When the pandemic hit, Priscilla started using dating apps more specifically to meet people, rather than just swipe, “We don’t really get outside interaction with people that we don’t know or are friends with, so, a dating app is an easy way to get validation romantically or sexually without having bars and stuff to go to.” During a time of ultra-isolation and heightened loneliness, college students are much more likely to get hooked to these apps. Getting little snippets of attention is not something you can get out at a local bar or party anymore, so when it’s as easy as downloading an app, it can get really addicting. Priscilla said that even when she ended up actually meeting people through apps, it rarely worked out because of things like “ghosting.”
Ghosts
People recorded experiencing more “casual acts of unkindness” when meeting others on dating apps because with no prior connection to someone, it was just easier to be mean to them. Priscilla mentioned a particular act of unkindness: ghosting. Ghosting is when someone you are texting or messaging on social media, typically for romantic reasons, abruptly stops responding and never contacts you again. She described a theory she had that dating online and dating apps created ghosting, “I really think ghosting is because of online dating. I don’t think that was as much of a thing when our parents used to set each other up with their friends and stuff like that.” People can very easily say whatever they want when they’re interacting with just an icon on a screen, increasing unpleasant interactions and feelings amongst online daters who were already living an isolated life pre pandemic making the online dating experience overwhelmingly unsatisfactory.
Another senior at University of Michigan, Sarah (woman, bisexual) who is a Tinder and Hinge user echoed Priscilla’s theory and this study, “I don’t like talking to strangers. I find it hard to be engaged in the conversation when I don’t know someone at all. Like, they don’t really feel like real people sometimes.” According to a ScienceAdvances study that analyzed 187,000 dating app users in numerous cities around the U.S., most users message those who are 25% more “desirable” than they are, themselves, creating a dating community of people ghosting each other left and right. Priscilla said dating apps made people generally more judgemental when they’re only looking at a profile, as opposed to meeting them in person. She described people seeming “two-dimensional” on dating apps, making it way easier to cut ties and never respond to someone. The concept of ghosting was reiterated by interviewees in a Fortune Brainstorm podcast saying that people are often on dating apps in the first place because they’re lonely and looking to connect with others, but most of the time they don’t get a response back. In the pandemic, negative interactions and getting no response at all can make college users even more insecure and lonely, making dating way harder, but in turn, putting them back on the apps.
The Queer Experience
Alex first started using dating apps freshman year because they felt a little socially awkward and had trouble meeting other queer people in person. In contradiction to their disapproval, they expressed gratitude for dating apps allowing queer people to “draw that line between thinking ‘oh, are we really good friends or is there romantic interest?’” The directness and certainty that someone is interested in you of a dating app is certainly a plus as opposed to constantly wondering.
With dating apps bringing more options and clarity for LGBTQ+ students, there were a few apps that were particularly unhelpful, or even detrimental, like Grindr and Tinder. Alex felt strongly about the toxicity of Grindr’s culture. They talked about how Grindr had created certain expectations amongst LGBTQ+ people that they could find and hook up with someone that had the exact look they were searching for, causing “racism, fat-phobia, xenophobia” and allowing people to “discriminate really easily.” With LGBTQ+ students experiencing negative and discriminatory interactions like Alex described during the pandemic, loneliness, shame, and mental health can be all the worse. However, Alex expressed hope for tech companies created apps like Her that “aimed way more towards femme people” and seemed like an effort to fix the dating app community for LGBTQ+ individuals after the “nightmare” of Grindr Alex described. They saw a brighter, safer future with apps like Her.
A University of Michigan freshman, Kayden (man, gay) joined dating apps during the pandemic to start looking for a partner more seriously. He mentioned his dissatisfaction with Tinder, “On Tinder, especially within the gay community, because you don’t have to fill out as much about yourself, there tends to be a lot more people that are on the DL [down-low] and their pictures are just like a black screen and you’re like ‘okay, nope’ because that typically means that they’re not comfortable enough yet to be actually in a relationship and they’re mostly looking for hookups.” Alex described their experience on Tinder as a “nightmare:” “I felt like everybody was either asking for a third or was looking for experimentation.” With experiences like this, LGBTQ+ students are at even more of a disadvantage as they may experience even more loneliness or hurt on apps during the pandemic.
Comparing Apps
Sarah described liking Tinder and having used it almost all year, more this year because of the pandemic. She particularly liked Tinder because she wasn’t looking for a relationship and enjoyed swiping along casually. She used Hinge when she was more interested in finding a partner, which was before the pandemic. Now, it’s much more difficult to actually meet up with people because of safety concerns, so she just goes on Tinder for fun randomly. Sarah, along with all of the other U of M students interviewed, still said there were lots of things they didn’t like about Tinder, like its superficiality and often pointlessness. Every U of M student interviewed said Tinder was specifically for hook-ups, while apps like Hinge were better for getting to know someone and finding relationships.
When comparing apps, Kayden expressed a lot more interest in Hinge, a dating app released in 2012 that blew up after Match invested in it in 2017. He said, “Hinge tends to be more serious because you have to fill out so much more about yourself.” Other students noted Hinge as a better option to other apps because the platform offers prompts for you to fill out, so you know more about each person you come across. Priscilla noted that Hinge was specifically for finding a relationship as opposed to Tinder, “And then Hinge is more for actually dating. I guess I feel like more people are trying to look for a relationship on Hinge. Or like not only a relationship, but just not a one time hook up.” It sounded like many of the students were looking for someone to spend more time with during a lonely pandemic and Hinge was better for finding that.
Priscilla also discussed apps like the League and Bumble. She deleted the League because it was “elitist” since you have to apply and can only get in if you go to a “good” school. There’s a specific list of schools for the app. She noted Bumble having conducted a “whole college push to try and become more popular with our age group.” Bumble recruited different college students to be “sponsors” for the app, getting more college students to mingle on it. Priscilla described this campaign as making Bumble more of a hook-up app like Tinder. Alex said that Bumble was a good app because it only allowed the more femme presenting person or woman to chat first, creating less availability for harrassment or unwanted attention. This was a good move on Bumble’s part as according to this Fortune Brainstorm podcast, one fifth of women have experienced threats of physical violence while using dating apps. However, Bumble still managed to encourage the hook-up culture that many students aren’t looking for in a socially isolating pandemic by imitating Tinder’s profile set up and matching process.
The Aftermath
Priscilla said after she graduates this spring and after her quarantine ends, hopefully soon, she will definitely still be using dating apps. She described it as a norm, “I just feel like it’s become so much more of a thing. That’s how people meet their partners now.” Dating apps are a huge trend that is continuing to rise, which could very well be due to their addicting nature, the pandemic, and increased loneliness, but the way they’ve become so imbedded in college student’s dating lives leaves us to believe that this generation of students will not stop using them in the future. Most U of M students interviewed joined apps to look for longer-term relationships and in a time when we are so isolated and mental health issues are on the rise, dating apps just leave us feeling more alone. No matter how many negative effects they may have on young people’s dating lives, dating apps have become the norm and are here to stay.
“I didn’t join because of peer pressure, but everybody else I knew that was single was on a dating app, so…. It just pretty much feels like the norm now.”