This Personality Trait Is Key To Online Dating Success
Contributed by: ElyseRomano on Monday, September 05 2016 @ 10:39 am
Last modified on
As online dating continues to spread around the world, scholars and scientists continue to investigate the practice. What makes an online dater successful? What makes the perfect profile? Is the perfect profile even achievable? What traits make singles more likely to find love online?
These are the questions asked by a new study[*1] published in the National Communication Association's journal Communication Monographs. The study looked at how specific types of content in online dating profiles affected viewers’ impressions and actions, and found that humility is key to online dating success.
“Online daters construct their profiles to attract potential partners and viewers’ assessments are based on the content of dating profiles,” explains the study. “However, little is known about the mechanisms or nature of the associations that connect variations in profile content to outcomes.”
The researchers delved into the issue by examining two kinds of profiles. The first, “selective-self presentation” profiles, allow the owner to highlight the most flattering information about themselves while downplaying the bad. The second, called “warranting,” provide access to “corroborating sites” (like a professional bio page or a blog to which they regularly contribute) that limit the owner’s ability to control how they are presented.
After assessing how selective self-presentation compared with warranting in helping to shape impressions, attraction, and trust in online dating profiles, the authors drew several conclusions.
- Bragging isn’t sexy. The study found that viewers negatively judged people who they perceived as bragging excessively about themselves, their looks, or their accomplishments. Braggers were considered less trustworthy and less socially attractive, thereby making viewers less inclined to date or contact those profile owners.
- People trust what you can’t control. Profiles with high warranting value were considered more trustworthy than other profiles. Linking to external sources of information about a person helped viewers verify content in a profile, which ultimately increased trust - but only when people also bragged less.
- The best bet is a combination. The most effective profiles combine low selective self-presentation with high warranting. The result is a person who seems “honest as well as humble and approachable,” according to the authors.
Also interesting to note is the finding that profiles exhibiting both high self-selective presentation and high warranting were perceived as arrogant or immodest. Unsurprisingly, that perception made viewers less interested in contacting them. Confidence is hot, but egotism is not. Successful daters know how to maintain the delicate balance between the two.
As for their final words of advice for singles, the authors suggest that online daters “should strive to present themselves as humble, 'real' people," especially if their goal is to establish a long-term relationship based on trust.