Dating

The pressure's on for singles in Shanghai. The Chinese capital's fertility rate has dropped to just 0.79 children per woman, and now the city is desperate to encourage more young people to meet, marry, and raise a family.

The center of the city's dating scene is Shanghai Expo Park, where thousands of eligible young men and women gather in hopes of meeting their matches. 38,000 singles and parents attended a June 1st matchmaking event in the park, hoping to revive a marriage rate that is expected to fall 17% this year.

Shanghai is China's richest city, largest port, and a leading financial center in the country. It is also the center of waves of social changes that are sweeping the nation. An urban shift is shrinking the pool of factory workers who sustain economic growth in the country, while the ranks of the elderly - who increase healthcare and pension costs - are on the rise. City-dwelling citizens with higher education levels and a greater focus on their careers are marrying later and having fewer children, causing the Shanghai birth rate to drop to half the national level.

These shifts have caused major changes for Chinese women, who have become a larger, and increasingly educated, percentage of the population. "In the past, women were match-made by their parents," says Juemin Zhou, director of the Shanghai Matchmaking Trade Association. "Then, it didn't matter how old you were, or if your partner was blind in one eye, you still had to get married. Now, if you don't find someone suitable, you just don't settle."

Gong Haiyan, co-chief executive officer of Jiayuan.com, China's largest online dating agency, reports that women's expectations of potential partners - like owning a house - have now skyrocketed. "The first thing they look for," said Hansen Huang, a male attendee at the matchmaking fair, "is if you have a decent job, what is your salary like, if you have an apartment. Women are looking for a partner who can provide so they can live relatively comfortably."

In spite of these shifts, many Chinese citizens remain traditional. A young bride is still considered ideal, and women who wait too long to settle down many be considered "leftovers." "Women can be very picky when they're young," said Huang. "But if you don't sell when it commands the highest value, you may miss the golden opportunity."

The pressure to wed may be high, but Shanghai is doing its best to respond: about 2,000 couples were successfully matched at last year's event, a figure that bodes well for this year's fair.

Now here's something that I never expected to need an app for...though now that I see it, I can't help but be intrigued.

Sarah Gray was in a long distance relationship when she found herself wondering whether it was time to bid her boyfriend farewell. The relationship did end up crumbling, but Gray found something good in the aftermath: a new app idea. The app, called Should I Dump My Boyfriend?, helps users answer the same question that Gray faced by tracking your feelings over a two-week period.

Forget about talking your friends ears off with the trivial details of your relationships or turning to silly Cosmo quizzes to answer your burning relationship questions. This app, which creates a graph that quantifies what you should do and provides customized advice, is the way of the future.

Step one is to keep track of your feelings. Record your ups and downs in the app, which sends a daily reminder to make sure that you stay on top of the tracking process. You can rate your boyfriend as often as you like, since you never know when you might be surprised by something he does, and can leave notes describing your feelings during each rating session.

When the rating process is complete, the app provides objective advice based on the unique patterns it analyzes in your entries. The idea is to help you spot trends that you may have missed in day to day life, and create clarity about why you might be sabotaging a good relationship or sticking with a bad one.

And it's not just useful for one relationship. The app saves all your entries from past boyfriends, so you can review and reflect at any point in the future. Mad at your man and wondering why you haven't dumped him yet? Check the app for reminders about what makes him so wonderful. Feeling the post-breakup blues and second-guessing your choice to dump the chump? Read through your old notes and statistics to refresh your memory about why he was such a dud, then count your blessings.

"Being able to see your relationship clearly and objectively is the 1st step on the path to a happy, healthy love-life," says Gray, :whether it's with him, with someone else, or on your own for a while." We're often to irrational in the moment to assess our feelings correctly, making the app a valuable asset when it comes to choosing partners wisely. "Sometimes, we need an objective voice to help us appreciate a good thing or accept something painful," Grey adds. "And this app helps us tap into the best voice of all - the one inside ourselves."

Check out the app on iTunes.

Cheaters can be identified by their voices. Highlighting your flaws in photographs may actually make you more attractive online. Listening to Adele could make you more a more desirable date. Men like women who have been dumped, and women prefer men who have done the dumping. Hamsters are rarely a dealbreaker.

That's what we've learned so far from YourTango's recap of "The 11 Weirdest Dating Studies Of 2011". We've got six more to go...what else has 2011 taught us about our love lives?

1. There may be a link between drinking and monogamy. According to Reason.com, the more a society practices monogamy, the more it consumes alcohol. Monogamy may also correlate with technological and cultural advancements.

2. Men take longer to get ready than women. Busted! We ladies may have the reputation for taking up the bathroom for hours, but a study this year found that men take an average of 81 minutes to get ready compared to a woman's 75 minutes. They even broke it down by task: 23 minutes in the shower, 18 minutes shaving, 10 minutes cleansing and toning, and 13 minutes selecting an outfit.

3. "Two Hearts Beat As One" is more than a U2 song. Ramesh Rao, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of California, says that "heart-synching" may be an accurate measure of how well two people connect on a physical and emotional level. When two hearts beat in sync because their magnetic fields are entangled, their rhythm can change and indicate how well a date is going.

4. Women shouldn't be overly friendly with their partner's friends. A study published in the American Journal of Sociology found a link between sexual dysfunction in older men and the friendship between their friends and female partners. When a woman has stronger relationships with her partner's friends than he does, it undermines his feelings of independence, privacy, and masculinity, causing him to feel insecure.

5. Women have better recall for things spoken in a deep voice. David Smith and a team from the University of Aberdeen found that women remember objects presented to them more accurately when they are introduced by a deep male voice, rather than a higher-pitched male voice. Low masculine voices also play a role in mate choice for women.

6. Men who cheat on their spouses are more likely to do themselves an injury...to a very private place. Only one word is needed to sum this study up: Ouch.

So there you have it... the 11 weirdest dating studies of 2011, and some interesting food for thought for 2012.

There are a few things that I look forward to at the end of every year. Christmas dinner with my family. Making resolutions for the new year. And all the Top 10 lists.

"Top 10 Albums Of The Year." "Top 10 Movies Of The Year." "Top 10 News Stories Of The Year." It's a quick, easy, and pop culture-friendly way to reflect on the major stories and scandals of the last 12 months, and this year YourTango has added a new list to the mix: The 11 Weirdest Dating Studies Of 2011.

Let's see what made the cut...

1. Men prefer to date women who have been dumped. A study published by the University of Michigan found that men prefer to date women who were dumped by their last boyfriends, while women prefer to date men who initiated their last breakup. The team behind the study speculates that when a man initiates a breakup it reinforces male dominance and traditional gender roles, whereas a woman who initiates a breakup is perceived as picky and high-maintenance.

2. Highlighting your flaws may make you more appealing on online dating sites. OkCupid ran a study that analyzed the photo vote patterns and messages from 43,000 female members. They found that falling in the middle of the attractiveness scale (being "cute" rather than "hot" or "unattractive") didn't always work out in women's favor. Playing up the features they thought that men wouldn't like, however, did prove to be a successful strategy for women.

3. People can identify a cheater by the sound of his or her voice. 120 male and female college students were asked to make vowel sounds in a range of pitches, then participants selected the voices that they thought were most attractive and the voices they thought belonged to cheaters. Men associated higher-pitched female voices with cheating, while women associated lower-pitched male voices with infidelity. There may be a biological imperative for the women's response: a deep voice could be indicative of a higher testosterone level, which may in turn be indicative of more promiscuity and an increased likelihood of cheating.

4. Adele could get you a date. Adele's most famous songs are about breakups, but it turns out that listening to her music may be a good way to hook up. A dating site called Tastebuds.fm, which matches potential dates based on their taste in music, found that the most successful online daters are fans of Adele's music. Lovers of Arcade Fire, Kings of Leon, and the Arctic Monkeys were also lucky in love, while Metallica, Linkin Park, and Eminem fans were the least popular dates.

5. Hamsters are unlikely to ruin your chances of getting a date. Yep, someone actually studied that! When Craigslist.co.uk asked single men and women what kind of pet would make them less inclined to date someone, the hamster won the coveted title of "Least Likely To Break A Couple Up." 28% said they wouldn't date a dog owner and 25% wouldn't date a cat owner, but only 10% said a hamster is a dealbreaker.

The remaining six weirdest dating studies of 2011 are waiting just around the corner...

Are cash-strapped single girls dating for free dinners?

According to a recent article in Business Insider, at least a few girls have.

Introducing 23-year-old Manhattan-dweller Jessica Sporty, a girl who says that her $45,000 a year salary couldn't cover her rent, credit card bills, and food expenses.

What did she do to cure her financial troubles? Did she ask for a raise, find a second job, or look for a cheaper living arrangement? Nope, those options were far too mainstream. This enterprising young lady logged onto a popular dating site and starting scoring free dinners by going on dates with clueless men.

Yep, you read that right. Sporty started eating out five nights a week using a rotation of different men that she met online. To avoid confusion and emotional attachment, she limited herself to no more than five dates with the same guy, and never allowed them to see where she lives. She chose her suitors based on their financial profiles, targeting the investment banker types who could treat her to dinners at the city's most expensive eateries.

And her strategy worked - she went from spending at least $500 a month on dinners to having someone else pick up the tab for her meals. At an average of $60+ per night, the savings started adding up quickly. She also stopped eating lunch and choose light breakfasts to save even more. Although her dating site has a $50 monthly subscription fee, she says that her dates more than made up for the expense. "I mean, a guy buys me three drinks at $15 a pop and that right there made up for my fee," she explained to Business Insider. One man, she claims, even dropped $200 for a bottle of champagne during a date.

Seeing her success, Sporty's roommates got in on the action too. The creative trio made spreadsheets about each man that detailed important data like their names, photos, and info from their dating site accounts. They let each other know where they were going each night and who they were going with, and always met their dates in public locations.

But, as they say, all good things must come to an end. Sporty began running into people she recognized from the site as online dating became increasingly popular in NYC. Eventually she tired of the scene, citing exhaustion and a weariness of "playing the game." She now has a steady boyfriend, and it seems as though she may have retired for good.

Was her strategy smart? Was it ethical? Was it gold digging, or simply a smart financial arrangement?

We're entering holiday season, which in my opinion is the best time to meet people and increase your dating prospects. With all the parties, dinners, and networking events, you're missing out if you turn down invitations. Halloween especially is a great time to mix things up in your love life if it's grown a little stale with endless coffee dates. There's something to be said for scary movies and dark nights.

So, if you're thinking of doing something off the beaten path on your next date, try some of these Halloween ideas:

Local haunted houses and tours. The fun of Halloween is getting scared and clinging to someone next to you...a perfect date situation (if you're attracted to each other)! Check your local paper or events listings for any places in your area. In L.A. where I live, Hollywood tours are a favorite-lots of legends of stars and mobsters meeting grisly ends, their ghosts lurking around to make an appearance on Halloween. Take a date that interests you and show her your bravery (or lack thereof).