OkCupid

When we left off, Christian Rudder and the OkCupid research team were tackling a unique question: What if there weren't so many white people?

The online dating world - and, in fact, the Internet at large - is dominated by white users, who make up the largest percentage of both OkCupid members (74%) and message recipients on the site (89%). After gathering and analyzing data based on 82 million messages sent on OkCupid, the researchers rearranged their findings to create an artificial environment in which the online dating world was not dominated by white members. The numbers of average monthly messages received, per person, changed across the board:

• For white members the number decreased, though not significantly.
• For Latinos, the number increased and surpassed the number for whites.
• For Asians the number skyrocketed, placing them ahead of all other ethnic groups when it came to the number of messages received per month.
• For black members the number also increased, though not quite enough to overtake the users of other ethnic backgrounds.

Age played a role, but a relatively minor one. Asians proved to be the most popular users regardless of the age of the message senders, receiving at least 30% - but often more - of the messages on OkCupid. Latinos also maintained a consistent level of popularity, hovering around 25% for all users aged 18-50. White members saw a decrease in popularity as senders aged, beginning at 25% for 18 year old users and steadily dropping to 15% for 50 year old users. The popularity of black members, in contrast, rose as senders aged.

Next, Rudder put together a fascinating chart that must be experienced to really be understood. The graph, called "Who People Are Messaging" takes a look at the relationship between "racial bias" and "racial composition." Each factor can be adjusted to show what the graph would look like under current conditions, as well as how the chart changes when racial bias no longer exists and racial composition is equal. Rudder also breaks the results down into graphs based on messaging preferences by age, in a racially-balanced world.

But as interesting as graphs, charts, and numbers can be, eventually we have to get back to reality and ask: What does all of this look like in the real world?

"The kind of messaging imbalance that currently exists has observable effects on how people think about race and dating," writes Rudder. "Search for 'interracial couple' on a stock photo site: you'll find a rainbow of Asians, Latinos, Blacks, and Indians, all hanging out with their white significant others." And if you enter "Why do ______ [insert non-white race of your choice here] women like..." into Google, it autocompletes with "white men."

Despite OkCupid's findings indicating that Asians are the most desired racial group in the country, white members are still dominating online dating sites simply because there is a greater number of them, and they seem to prefer to date within their ethnic group...which brings up the question for next time: Do all races prefer to date within their own ethnic group? And what does that mean for the dating world?

The OkTrends blog has already taken a look at "How Your Race Affects The Messages You Get" and "The REAL 'Stuff White People Like,'" and now the OkCupid research team is at it again, this time taking on the subject of race by examining race relations in America and asking the question: What if there weren't so many white people?

"Since most thinking about race hinges on the fact that one particular race predominates," writes Christian Rudder, "what if, using statistical models, you could make that predominance disappear?" Currently, white members receive more messages than non-white members on OkCupid, though it is unclear if this is an indication of their "popularity" or their population. If the world - or at least the users of OkCupid - were more racially balanced, would that statistic change?

To find out, OkCupid ran a study based on 82 million messages sent by members over the course of the last few months. The researchers found that OkCupid is actually less white than the rest of the Internet in America, but they were unable to make direct group-to-group comparisons because Quantcast, the media measurement service that provides their demographics, doesn't provide multiracial data. White members made up 74% of the OkCupid population, followed by:

Other: 13%

Latino: 5%

Black/Asian: 4% each (a tie)

White members also received the vast - and I mean vast - majority of messages sent on the site (a gigantic 89%!). In fact, white members were the most popular message recipients regardless of the senders' ethnicity.

After gathering the basic data, the OkCupid team experimented with their findings, using Asian users as an example. They found that Asian members sent 3 times as many messages to white members as they did to other Asian people. The breakdown:

White: 71%

Asian: 23%

Latino: 5%

Black: 2%

Taking into account the fact that white members outnumber Asian members 19:1, however, the findings can be viewed differently. Rudder rearranges all the ratios from the study and, via a little math wizardry, comes to the conclusion that, if there were an equal number of Asian people and white people on the site, Asian users would actually overwhelmingly prefer to message other Asians. In a world in which the population was not dominated by white folks, in which every user had a completely equal chose, the average number of monthly messages each ethnic group received would be very different.

...but you'll have to tune in next time to find out the details!

I was surprised today to find out that Match.com announced that they have acquired the free dating site OKCupid. The purchase price is $50 million plus potential future payments which depends upon performance in the coming year of the dating site. OKCupid makes most of its revenue through displaying online advertising. Their secondary revenue generating tool is a paid upgrade membership option. The CEO and co-founder of OkCupid, Sam Yagan will continue to run the business and oversee all day-to-day operations.

OKCupid membership base has seen a large increased over the last 18 months. Their members tend to be younger adults which is a market Match.com is looking to develop.

This time last year Match.com purchased Singlesnet.com for an undisclosed amount. (see Story) and in the summer, the year before, they had acquired People Media for $80 million (see Story). I wonder who they will buy next year? 😊

For more on the story you can read the press release. To find out more about these two dating sites, please read our Match.com review and our OKCupid.com review.

"If someone doesn't think you're hot, the next best thing for them to think is that you're ugly."

It's a wild claim, but it's the conclusion drawn by OkCupid's latest study, "The Mathematics Of Beauty." We reviewed the data gathered from the experiment in two previous posts (you can find them here and here), so let's get straight to everyone's most burning questions:

"What on earth is going on here? And what does it mean for me?"

The first question can be answered using game theory. We're presented with a paradox: when some men on a dating site think a woman is unattractive, other men are more likely to message her, and when some men consider a woman "cute," other men show less interest in her.

Game theory explains the paradox like this:

• A man who is interested in a woman has less competition for her affections from men who are not interested in her.
• Believing that other men are not interested the woman, the man will begin thinking "Perhaps she's feeling lonely and unappreciated because men aren't pursuing her. I have a greater chance of connecting with her because my competition is so weak."
• That man would therefore have increased incentive to send her a message, because the odds of it being received positively are higher.

• On the other hand, a woman who is universally considered "cute," but not "hot," is likely to appear more in-demand than she actually is.
• To the average man, she is attractive enough to create the impression that many other men are interested in her, too.
• Some men will decide to take their chances and send her a message anyway, but many will think that the competition is too strong and will chose to move on to someone else they think they have a better chance with.

It's difficult to make a change to your overall level of attractiveness, but this theory can be used to your advantage in other ways. The key to success, according to this study, is to create variance, a difference of opinion regarding your attractiveness. In Christian Rudder's words: "Take whatever you think some guys don't like - and play it up." Think of the Suicide Girls type - tattoos and piercings aren't for everyone, but some people love them. People with body modification know that it makes them unique, show it off, and don't are if some people don't like it. And it gets them lots of attention.

You don't have get "Mom" tattooed on your bicep or pierce your eyebrow to get dates, but the principle is the same. Browse through the profile photos of any dating site, and you'll see countless pictures that are taken to hide a trait that is supposedly undesirable or unattractive, like a angle that disguises a large nose or a cropped photo that only shows the face of an overweight person. But if the OkCupid research team is right, "we now have mathematical evidence that minimizing your 'flaws' is the opposite of what you should do." Display the mole on your face or the embarrassing tattoo you got when you were drunk with pride! The men who aren't into your look will increase your chances with those who are, and the ones who do like will fall for you even harder.

To find out more about this online dating service, you can check out our OKCupid.com review.

Kristen Bell is universally thought of as good-looking.

Megan Fox is frequently considered super hot, but is also regarded as unattractive by many.

And how do regular OkCupid users stack up against such famous competition?

To explore how mathematics can determine a man's reaction to a woman's appearance, the OkCupid research team found users willing to submit their photographs to scrutiny under the site's 5 star rating system. Woman A had an attractiveness rating of 3.4/5 stars, and the number of messages she receives per month is 0.8 times the site's average. Woman B had an attractiveness rating of 3.3, and the number of messages she receives per month is 2.3 times the site's average. Though their star rating is very similar, the number of responses these women receive is very different. The pattern of votes that determined their attractiveness rating is also very different: for Woman A, there was a clear consensus, while for Woman B, there was a split decision. In simple terms:

• Girls who are described as "cute" tend to be ignored by men.
• The more men as a group disagree about a woman's level of attractiveness, the more they end up liking her.
• Having some men think she is "ugly" can actually work in a woman's favor.

These are three of the surprising conclusions drawn from the latest OkTrend's study, "The Mathematics of Beauty." This time, the researchers at OkCupid focused on female attractiveness by looking beyond a woman's profile photo and "into the reaction she creates in the reptile mind of the human male." As always, the data used was gathered from the activity of actual OkCupid users, in this case 1.54 million votes, 596,000 messages, and 64,000 profiles.

It should come as no surprise that the hottest OkCupid members receive more page views and messages than less good-looking users, and it probably also isn't a surprise that men dedicate more time to the pursuit of attractiveness than women do. A beautiful woman on OkCupid receives approximately 4 times more messages than an average woman, and 25 times more messages than an unattractive woman. The OkCupid team examined a sample of 5,000 women, and sorted them based on attractiveness and the number of messages they received during the last month.

The graph, which can be found here in the original article, was adjusted to account for differences in factors like "race, location, age, profile completeness, login activity and so on," so that the only meaningful difference between the subjects plotted on the chart was their physical attractiveness. The graph revealed an extremely wide range of results, showing women with the same level of attractiveness receiving a vastly different number of messages per month.

Armed with the data, the OkCupid team set out to determine what caused the disparities they had found...and the key, it turns out, is in mathematics.

If we rate attractiveness using the classic 10-point scale, a woman who is rated a 7 could be a 7 because everyone who sees her considers her to be one. On the other hand, she could be a 7 because the majority of people consider her a 10, and a few think she is a 0. If all we know about a woman is that she's a 7, we don't know how that number was determined. Writer Christian Rudder uses actress Kristen Bell to illustrate the point: while she is certainly good-looking, she is not out-of-this-world, supermodel hot. Most people would probably rate her as "very attractive," while a smaller number of people will likely consider her "super hot" and few would say she is "unattractive." In the case of Megan Fox, however, many people are likely to rate her attractiveness as extremely high - higher than Kristen Bell's - but a significant number of people will also probably rate her attractiveness as low (lower than Kristen Bell's).

What happens when this theory is applied to real OkCupid users?

We'll find out next time.