Dating

She smokes. He doesn’t tip waiters. She’s obsessed with her phone. He gets wasted every weekend. Are these things merely irritating, or are they harbingers of a total relationship meltdown up ahead?

According to research by scientists at Western Sydney University, Indiana University, the University of Florida, Singapore Management University, and Rutgers University, dealbreakers have more power in long-term relationships than in short-term relationships. Women have more dealbreakers than men, but both men and women who consider themselves to be highly desirable have more dealbreakers than the average person.

Overall, daters tend to weigh dealbreakers more heavily than dealmakers - meaning negative attributes overshadow good ones, no matter how good they are.

In other words, you’d better clean up your act. If you want to put your best foot forward in a relationship, it’s essential to recognize your own bad habits and work to improve them.

Dating apps have provided a great way for people to connect, but along with the positives, the downside to dating apps still looms large - users aren't necessarily safe when they are meeting new people.

Dating app users can become easy targets for sexually predatory behavior. The question of security in online dating has once again entered the news headlines, thanks to the conviction of Stephen Port, a UK man who was accused and found guilty of killing four men he met through gay dating apps.

Port met his victims by catfishing them through various dating apps including Grindr, posting fake profiles and avoiding using any real details about himself, encouraging them to meet in person before drugging their drinks. 

Do you typically meet a first date for coffee or drinks, not wanting to commit to anything more until you know you hit it off?

Turns out this might not be the best strategy for finding love. Dating app Coffee Meets Bagel recently surveyed more than 1,000 couples who met through its app to see what made their first date so successful. The company then surveyed more than 6,000 singles to compare their thoughts about first dates, and found they don’t often agree. Here’s what we can learn.

Following are nine findings that increase your chance of first date success:

It’s election season, and one thing is certain: there are different attitudes, habits, and priorities among people living in different regions of the United States. But it's not just about politics - some regional differences hold up in other parts of life, including dating habits and preferences.

Online dating service Badoo recently surveyed 1,000 of its users across different regions of the U.S. to compare and contrast their dating habits, taking into consideration age, gender and sexuality.

Some of the findings include:

Extroverts can often be misunderstood. They are charming, engaging people who are full of curiosity and you tend to seek out adventure. Extroverts are also energized by being around people, so parties and social gatherings are what they crave.

But when an extrovert is dating an introvert, there can be challenges. You might feel the need to be heard, or to talk about issues that bother you, while your dates might avoid confrontation and tend to retreat. Or you might fall in love over and over, but things don’t quite work out.

Extroverts are the life of the party, and are exciting to date, especially for introverts. It’s easy to take over making decisions, making plans, and guiding a relationship or conversation forward, but the extrovert needs to be careful, too. Relationships are a two-way street, so they require compromise.

Following are some tips for extroverts when dating:

One of the biggest hurdles we have to overcome in order to find lasting love is our own dating history. Many of us have experienced heartbreak, which is a kind of trauma, and sometimes, you can get stuck in your feelings and apprehension without even realizing it.

The key to finding a healthy, lasting relationship and not repeating the same old mistakes in dating is to understand your past, and then to make a decision to move on from it. Easier said than done, because most of us have habits and patterns that are tough to break.

Following are some ways to help yourself move on into healthier dating patterns: