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IF YOU’RE looking for love, chances are you have considered the online dating scene. According to Mark Brooks, editor of onlinepersonalswatch.com, half of singletons in the US – around 40 million people – now use internet dating. And a fair number, around 20 per cent, find long-term romance that way.
So what is the best strategy? Psychologists who study romance are fascinated by this question as cyberspace changes all the rules. Online, you can be who you want to be. Just ask David Pollard.
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Pollard’s avatar in Second Life is Dave Barmy, a sharp-dressing hunk with flowing locks, designer stubble and sunglasses. is bald, fat and being divorced by his wife after she caught him having an online affair with another Second Life avatar.
Doing a Dave Barmy on a dating site obviously wouldn’t work, but how much room is there for embellishment? Psychologist at Nottingham Trent University in the UK decided to find out. She studied 60 men and women who had signed up to Australia’s most popular dating site , looking at how people described themselves in their profiles and what attracted them to potential dates ().
As you might expect, Whitty discovered that honesty is the best policy. “There is no forgiveness of any inaccuracies,” she says. “If you’re an inch shorter than you say you are, you’ll be found out.”
Unlike in games and chatrooms, where people are happy to conduct their relationship solely online, daters want to get offline – and get it on – as soon as possible. At that point, your profile has done all it can and the real you takes over. The pressure is on: it is that first face-to-face meeting that determines if a relationship will progress, according to two-thirds of the daters in Whitty’s study.
So it makes sense for online daters to keep things real. Pretending you look like Brad Pitt and lying about your income may get you lots of dates, but that is as far as it will get you. Once the real you turns up, your disappointed date will judge you as dishonest and you are unlikely to reach first base.
Another turn-off is profiles littered with cheesy clichés. One woman in Whitty’s study complained that so many people say they enjoy walks on the beach that she is surprised the beach isn’t overrun.
Online dating sites are getting wise to the advantages of keeping things real. now allow people to rate the accuracy of their dates’ profiles after they have met.
That’s not to say a little exaggeration doesn’t help. Both male and female daters are primarily seeking good looks. Websites such as will put you in touch with a photographer who will snap you in a flattering pose and in forgiving light. As the old adage says, you only get one chance to make a first impression.
