deep dive dating survey: insights from 20-somethings, part 2

Here is the second set of responses from my eight question informal survey about dating in your 20’s right now. Consistent with my last post, I have bolded each question and then portions of answers that I thought were the most revealing. The first question was inspired by a friend who told me that her attractive, social daughter admitted to her that she had not flirted with anyone in over three months. We were so shocked by this and wondered whether flirting was a lost art. From these responses, it sounds like there is plenty of flirting – in person and online – going on. The second question tries to dig deeper into what it feels like to try to meet people using the dating apps. This is a mixed bag of perspectives and some really surprising insights.

Do you flirt? Do you know how to flirt in person? 

Why of course I do! I have it easy. My personality itself is flirtatious, bubbly, and I love banter. I am an incredibly social person and feel comfortable talking to just about anyone who crosses my path, so the flirting aspect of dating feels natural. Most of the time it comes down to the vibes in person. Do we hit it off? Do I feel comfortable in their presence? Are they curious about me? Whether they are capable of flirting back is still in question. 

Absolutely! With mixed success, but part of the fun is seeing if you can create banter with someone, and sometimes you definitely can’t. My friends and I have a lot of fun discussing openers to get the conversation flowing, and often land on excessively stupid ones intended to get a laugh. A running favorite is “How’s your New Year’s resolution doing?”, in June.

Yes and yes in person is easier.

Depends on the vibe, it’s fun to flirt when meeting new people. I wish I flirted more when out and about! Sometimes it’s easier to just talk with friends and not interact with strangers at bars.

I don’t flirt nor do I know how to flirt in person.

Yessss I love flirting. I like to practice flirting with everyone, even my friends sometimes! It can be awkward and seem like a big deal if you think of it as the ONE big, specific thing. I reframe it as trying to trick someone into liking you. Also, I’m very curious about people and that helps with flirting a lot.

Yes. I am a big flirt. I flirt with everyone. I practice flirting with people I am not even necessarily attracted to just for fun. I think that even when we are in relationships, it is important that we never stop flirting. There are obviously boundaries to the flirting but I think it is an important way to exercise our sexuality.

I flirt unconsciously…I think it’s silly to flirt over the phone. I’ve never been one to take myself too seriously with romance. I don’t think people are melting when I pull a flirty move on them – because I don’t. Being myself is my way of flirting and the right people will be attracted to that.

Yep but to no avail.

Yes, i’m not very good at it unless the vibes are there. I flirt with my eyes and smile.

Yes. I have always had a very flirty personality, especially when talking to guy friends/guys I’m not necessarily interested in — which has gotten me into some trouble (to say the least.) I’ve never necessarily had issues with flirting — it comes pretty naturally to me. That being said, when I’m nervous around someone I really like/feel things could start getting serious, I’m not always myself which can affect my flirting ability. 100% a defensive mechanism. But overall, I feel I have a lot of power when flirting and tend to have the upper hand/am in control of the conversation. Finding people who match my flirting style is my best way that I’m able to weed people out — if they can’t keep up, I know they’re not the person for me.

Of course, my friends and I practice every weekend. I think the pillars of flirting are: be yourself, don’t be afraid to get rejected, and don’t be needy.

No/no.

The first pillar is simple, why would you ever want to be anyone but yourself? You’re going to need to keep that up for the foreseeable future of your relationship, so starting off on a shaky foundation is a recipe for disaster. That is not to say never tone-change. Just like you might change the way you behave around your boss versus your Barry’s instructor, it’s perfectly okay to slightly change the way you act around different girls, so long as it is genuine and still “true” to who you are.

The second pillar is the one where people get tripped up. If you’re not a good flirt, you’ll probably get rejected. If you get rejected, you probably won’t like it. Because you don’t like it, you might not want to get rejected again. Because you don’t want to get rejected again, you might flirt much more rarely. Because you flirt much more rarely, you don’t get any practice. Because you don’t get any practice, you will remain a bad flirt. If you don’t take rejection personally and never allow it to discourage you, eventually you’ll probably become a good flirt. My friends who are the best flirts are just truly fearless. When they are rejected, they find it funny and natural. They use it to reflect on how they can do better next time. They think about what they might have said that turned the person off. Or, and this is the most frequent and true conclusion, they recognize that they’re not going to be everyone’s cup of tea. They are confident in themselves and don’t want _every_ girl to like them. Instead, they just want to talk to the girls that do like them.

The third pillar is a way of carrying yourself. Girls can sense neediness and demonstrating it is the shortest path to getting rejected. As stated before, the best flirts recognize that there will be a select few that like them. Therefore, flirting is just two people getting to know each other, and time will eventually reveal if there is a match. If you desperately want the other person to be in the category of those who like you, the other person will sense it and begin to question why you’re not just confident that they will end up liking you regardless.

With these three pillars serving as a solid foundation, flirting no longer becomes the peacock dance that it feels like to most people. Instead, it’s just two people figuring out whether their Venn diagrams overlap.

Yes, and yes although I do find I do it less than maybe I should. My style of flirting is very much just a conversation that is slightly on the banter side, but think I have relatively similar conversations with friends new and old that I would have with someone I am romantically interested in, and I think it all falls in the playful flirty category rather than overt hitting on someone. I think more direct flirting is something I do far more now than I would have as a teen or college kid.

Do you think dating apps make people more superficial?

Yes but no.

Yes. Everyone is a bot.

Yes, but I think people will be superficial if they are in real life too. It’s subjective.  My friends and I never agree on who we like anyway. A cute boy is usually cute and you can tell who is creepy, etc. Dating will always commodify dating and prey on insecurities, people are paying for Raya or more “likes”. I think if you’re entering a territory of feeling bad or hopeless about dating, get off the app!

Yes, I think it allows people to overlook someone over one thing they deem “unattractive.”

Honestly, no because a lot of times people look different or give totally different energy in person than they do online. If anything, I think it’s less superficial. You’re taking a guess as to what someone looks like and hoping for the best rather than already seeing them in person and knowing you are attracted to them.

Yes, I think it also ruins the allure of wondering if someone likes you or is attracted to you. Apps are designed for you to be sexy but not slutty, funny but not too much, it essentially feels like the America Ferrera Barbie monologue.

Not necessarily, I actually think the way you present yourself online makes it easier to determine what you’re like at your core, or rather what values come to light through your online presence (if someone is posting only selfies or if there are animals/family/nature/etc instead). For example, you will never catch me dating an influencer type! People who are superficial were that way before they found an online presence.

Of course, because it makes you think about how you present to the whole world. It’s another form of branding yourself.

This question feels a bit leading. Though if it was “How do apps change peoples values or interests” I think you’d probably still end up with consensus around “superficial”. I think dating on an app is innately superficial, especially with respect to appearance, but it has not made society more superficial as it is colloquially defined (appearance, income, etc.). In fact, I have observed from my friends that with in-person dating, it is much more about confidence and humor than any other “superficial” traits.

I believe the world has become more superficial in that the cycle between being open to a relationship and being closed to a relationship is much shorter than before. Although folks are still judging one another on historically-typical traits, (e.g., family-oriented, kindness, confidence, humor) they are quicker than ever to write the other person off if they do not check one of these boxes from their perspective.

This is a different type of superficial that I would attribute to unrealistic expectations derived from social media, dating apps, movies, tv, and more.

Yessss! You can quite literally pay to filter (in or out) for what you’re looking for.

Yes, without question. There are people I fall for hard in a bar on a night out that I would never look at twice on a dating app. A dating app also has the flaw of giving anyone considered even remotely above average attractiveness by a population a huge influx of compliments and dopamine inducing flattery, but not necessarily moving them any closer to finding someone great. If anything it desensitizes you to the comments and praise, putting the right ones in with all the wrong.

To some extent. It depends on the person. There are people who are superficial and on the apps, but the apps don’t make them more superficial. If you’re a genuine person, you see beyond photos. You see the personality that comes through in the prompts. Though there are times not much is shared within the prompts and I’m not drawn to those people. 

I wouldn’t say superficial, but you become defined by a couple of photos and the best one-liner that you can put together for a bio. So, it naturally has to be a bit superficial. But ultimately, that goes away once you actually go out.

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Thanks for reading along! I have two more posts that include questions and answers from this articulate, thoughtful and insightful group of young adults. I feel like I am learning so much and, as always, look forward to hearing your feedback.