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Originally posted at datingnews.com by Amber Brooks

The Scoop: Dating has changed significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Many singles now get to know potential partners by spending more time connecting through video chats and over the phone. Anthropologist and Match.com Advisor Helen Fisher said she thinks these changes will be permanent — and beneficial to future daters. Couples who get to know each other better early on, and singles who figure out what they don’t want, can create stable, more committed partnerships.

The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent quarantines have changed modern dating. Gone are casual first dates at coffee shops, and no longer do many singles lock eyes with a potential partner across a crowded bar.

Helen Fisher, an Anthropologist and Chief Scientific Advisor for Match.com, has collected results for her annual survey Singles in America for the last 10 years. The study used a national representative sample of 5,000 single Americans, based on the US census.

The results of the survey this year revealed some new trends, including that 58% of dating app users said they were more intentional in dating online. Meanwhile, 63% said they spent more time getting to know potential partners using the internet and their mobile devices.

Another surprising change is that singles are de-emphasizing looks, with 53% of respondents noting that they had changed what they wanted in a partner. Interestingly, there was also an increase in the willingness to date someone of a different ethnicity, as 24% of respondents said they were now more open to finding a partner of another race.

Survey results showed that, as they moved away from focusing on external characteristics, singles started to prioritize meaningful conversations and stability.

“We’re seeing people be more honest, and self-disclosure leads to intimacy. There is less emphasis on your looks and their looks, and more focus on someone who has a full-time job and is financially stable,” Helen told us.

It is clear, said Helen, that despite restrictions, lockdowns, and the COVID-19 pandemic, singles are still looking for love. Helen said she isn’t surprised by that reality.

“Cupid has beat quarantine. Love is a basic brain system, like the fear or anger system. It will never disappear,” she said with a laugh.

COVID-19 Has Changed Romance — For the Better

The COVID-19 pandemic has had many adverse effects. However, Helen suggests that dating and relationship-building have flourished.

One reason singles have bonded more effectively is because they’re getting to know each other before having sex. And they can connect more completely without meeting face-to-face through the rise of video dating.

Technology offers singles new ways to assess their compatibility. For instance, if two people don’t have shared values, they’re likely not to see each other again after their first meeting.

Helen notes that video chatting serves the same assessment function as a first date. She reported that 50% of singles in the survey who used video dating during the pandemic said they had fallen in love, and 56% said they had felt a romantic connection.

They’re using it as a vetting process to decide if they want to meet up in person. We will see more meaningful first dates because singles will already know they want to be there. When you’ve spoken to someone for months via video chatting, you probably know whether you’d like to kiss them too,” she told us.

Another benefit of video chatting is that sex is off the table. Singles don’t have to negotiate sex, or even physical touch at all, meaning that they can determine whether they click in other ways.

Further, financial concerns are not as important in video chatting. Couples don’t have to decide if they want to meet up in a coffee shop or a fine restaurant — and the social implications of those meet-up spots aren’t relevant, either.

“The bad boy and the bad girl are out. Serious conversations and meaningful conversations are in,” Helen told us.

Predicting and Explaining Trends

Recently, she revised her 1994 book “Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray”. The book explores conventions of marriage in 80 societies worldwide, along with explanations about adultery, the brain circuitry of romantic love, and attachment and the future of the family.

That research led her to conclude that two-income partnerships are not only ancient but highly beneficial to marriages.

“For millions of years, women commuted to work to gather their fruits and vegetables,” Helen said. “And regularly came home with 50% or more of the evening meal. Women were regarded as economically, socially and sexually equal to men.”

But when the agricultural revolution emerged some 10,000 years ago, women could no longer wander off the farm to do their gathering, while men’s roles became more and more important as farmers. And with this, a whole new set of beliefs arose, including virginity at marriage, a woman’s place is in the home, the man is head of the household, and till death us do part.

“Today,” as Helen said, “all these agrarian credos are disappearing before our eyes. In fact, we are returning to life as it was in our hunting/gathering past — with the rise of women in the work force and the double-income family. That has to be good for partnerships.”

Helen also wrote a book called “Why Him? Why Her?: Finding Real Love By Understanding Your Personality Type”. The book shows that humanity has evolved four basic styles of thinking and behaving associated with four specific brain systems and that we are naturally drawn to some people rather than others.

If an individual is drawn to a personality type that clashes with theirs, that may explain why they struggle to make relationships last.

Helen is currently working on a companion to this 2009 book.

“My new book explains why you’re drawn to this kind of person in love and in business and how you can reach them naturally, using brain science. I no longer believe in the golden rule; I believe in the platinum rule: do unto others as they would have done to themselves. Understand who they are biologically (as well as culturally), and then you can reach them at their core,” she told us.

Helen Fisher: Meeting a Partner Online Can Improve a Couple’s Future

Some may suggest that meeting a partner online isn’t as good as meeting them in person. However, Helen said that this misconception has been disproven time and again. Meeting a partner online may lead to longer-lasting, happier marriages.

After reading a study out of the University of Chicago that covered online dating benefits, Helen pondered why that would be.

“As it turns out, people who meet online are more likely to be fully employed, more likely to have higher education, and more likely to be seeking a commitment. Online dating is likely to lead to more stable partnerships,” she told us.

That emotional, intellectual connection has been highlighted during the pandemic as couples have to wait longer to meet face to face. The new way of meeting and deciding to marry contributes to a phenomenon Helen calls “slow love.”

“Slow love is about people being careful about who they commit to. Millennials are spending a great deal of time building a stable career and figuring out who they really want before they tie the knot,” Helen told us.

Couples are marrying later these days than in the past. From the 1950s through the 1970s, women often married at around age 20 and men at around age 23, on average. Now, women marry at age 28 while men marry at 30, on average.

“The later you marry, the more likely you are to create a stable, happy long-term relationship. This slow love, a long period of courtship, will contribute to more stable partnerships,” Helen said.

This pandemic has slowed down courtship even more. These new dating habits, including the rise of video chatting, are likely to last after the pandemic subsides because, during a video chat, sex and money are off the table, and singles can vet potential partners before they spend their valuable time and money on a first date.

As Fisher says, “We’ll be seeing more meaningful first dates and singles will be kissing fewer frogs.”

Originally posted at datingnews.com by Amber Brooks

Hail to my single friends on National Singles Week.  I’m among you.  And I’m not alone.  Some 50.2 percent of all adult Americans are now single.  And we rock—as is clear from the Match.com 2013 Singles in America study of all Americans, not the Match membership. 

Some 65% of us “work out” at least once a week. Over 80% of us save our money for a rainy day–or a great vacation.  And 65% of us are out one to two nights a week with friends.  We are on the move. 

We are also hip.  Over 50% of us think about sex every day; 39% of us have dated someone we met on line; and the vast majority of those of reproductive age want to tie the knot.  

But what is most impressive about my fellow Singles is what they seek in a partnership. They are shedding the racism and religious bigotry of myriad past generations to seek a far more intimate relationship. Today 74% of singles would date someone from a different ethnic background; 70% of singles would date someone with different religious beliefs; and only14% would marry for money.  Instead, over 95% of singles—men as well as women—say it’s “very important” to find a mate who respects them, whom they can trust and confide in, who can communicate his/her needs, and who makes them laugh. And what do they want to do with a beloved?  travel!   Singles are optimistic too:  89% believe they can stay married to the same person forever. 

And macho men are history.  Over 86% of men would date a woman who makes considerably more money, is much better educated and is far more intellectual than themselves.  Cougars aren’t on the prowl either: 76% of single women would not make a committed relationship with a man who is 10 years younger.  Instead, women want their wings—more time to spend with friends; more space in a partnership to pursue their interests.  

Everyone wants life to be meaningful; today’s Singles also want life to be fun.  I’ll play my part on National Singles Week. I’m heading off to buy some hot shoes to wear with my skinny jeans.  

What will you do on Father’s Day?  Skip it?   From the results of a new study of 1500 men, that’s what many men expect.  

How odd that we overlook this holiday.  Fatherhood is human.  New fossil finds from East Africa suggest that ancestral men and women began to form pair-bonds over four million years ago, rearing their children as a team.   Men still parent—everywhere in the world.   Moreover, I shall maintain that men are moving forward, busting entrenched myths about men’s roles as fathers and reassuming ancestral behaviors toward their young.

As this survey vividly shows, men are no longer scuttling off to play ballgames with comrades as the chores of parenting mount around them; instead men are taking on fatherhood with pride and gusto.  Some 68% of the men reported that they bonded with their baby in about the same amount of time as did the mother.   Fathers are sharing housework too.   Almost half (48%) of new dads say they are equally busy in the laundry room; 46% do just as many dishes; 34% prepare just as many family meals; and 43% spend equal time with the mop and vacuum cleaner as your partners.  Yet dads also continue their traditional responsibilities of yard work, auto care and household repair.  

Dads are changing their priorities too.  Time with single and childless friends; hours playing group sports; watching television: these have all become less important, these men report.  Some 50% are more conscious of their health.  And 44% say that parenting has made them more practical. 

Moreover, 70% find fatherhood fulfilling; 72% are confident in their parenting ability; 58% feel they spend enough quality time with their children; and 89% think they are good fathers.   In fact, 59% believe they are better dads than their fathers were.   Their own fathers, these dads estimate, were better at providing financially; but they believe that they spend more time caring for and educating their children, as well and more quality time with their partner.   Indeed, 54% feel closer to their parenting partner.

In 1989, sociologist Arlie Hochschild wrote a highly popular book, The Second Shift, about the struggles of working women who also do the vast majority of childcare and housework.  Are men now struggling with the second shift as well?  Perhaps. Some 48% of these dads also report that they have become more stressed with fatherhood.

This study captures a sea change in men’s parenting attitudes and behaviors.  As women have poured into the paid labor force, they have smashed long held myths about women’s interests and priorities—particularly the mantra that a woman’s place is in the home.  But men are smashing stereotypes of men as well.  They are assuming more duties around the house. And this is natural.  In fact, both sexes are returning to habits our forebears developed long ago.  For millions of years ancestral women commuted to work to gather fruits and vegetables, returning home with over 50% of the evening meal.  Women were crucial to the labor force.  And men were crucial in the home.   Men educated the boys.   And when in camp, they helped to entertain, soothe and educate their growing young.

Do dads think differently than moms?  “Yes,” replied 91% of fathers in this survey.   I was glad to see this response.   Some Americans would have us believe that men and women are (almost) exactly alike.  What nonsense.   Men and women are, on average, different in many ways.  But men and women are like two feet:  They need each other to get ahead.  And as the roles of women expand, men’s roles are expanding too.  Unchained from rigid traditions that arose during our farming past and have kept men out of the nursery for centuries, men can once again express who their really are–energetic, caring, responsible, available dads.