The American Dating Drought and Hope for Fixing It

America, and every other nation in the world, must robustly regain the long and devastating declines in marriage, fertility and married parenting for its own national growth and vitality.Growth cannot happen without each of these.

And none of this happens unless boy meets girl. There is no alternative hack. So, we must ask,“What is the state of dating today?”

By nearly all diverse indices, it’s a mess. It’s just not happening. The good news though, is that the very real dating crisis is not from lack of desire. 

This fact is evidenced in a new phenomenon overtaking elite universities like Stanford, Princeton, MIT and Columbia. It’s called Date Drop, invented by a Stanford grad student to match students for dating opportunities. Date Drop allows friends to match friends who they think would be great together, the algorithm tests their compatibility, and users excitedly wait for new matches to “drop” every Tuesday evening.  

Stanford has 7,500 undergraduates and more than 5,000 of them have used the matchmaking algorithm, leading The Wall Street Journal to explain it “has consumed the school — and highlighted the challenges of finding love.” Yet, they note, today’s young adults are “intimidated by real-life courtship and overwhelmed by the endless scroll of dating apps.”

This dating interest/anxiety conclusion jibes closely with new data from a national survey conducted jointly by the Institute for Family Studies and the Wheately Institute entitled “The Dating Recession: How Bad is It and What Can We Do?”

Their nationally representative sample of 5,275 unmarried adults (aged 22-35) found that about two-thirds who are interested in dating have never or seldom dated in the last year. The reason they are not dating is not from disinterest. 

This survey found that 60% of men and 47% of women expressed interest in starting a relationship with someone. Yet, this notes a concerning shift happening with emerging men and women. Pew Research Center reported late last year that while girls have traditionally been more likely to say they want to get married one day, boys are now more likely by a sizable margin of 74 to 61%. The share of young men saying this has remained unchanged for the last 30 years. The share of girls desiring marriage has dropped 22 percent.

The majority of both still want to marry though. 

Only 14% of the IFS/Wheatley nationally representative sample said they do not expect to marry, while 61% said they definitely expect to marry and 25% said they were unsure if it would happen. Similarly, only 16% of men and 17% of women have no interest in starting a romantic relationship.

And dating intentions are more positive than most might assume. 

Casual dating and opportunistic hook-ups are not what most men and women are looking for. These scholars explained, “We found that young adults — both men and women, younger and older — strongly endorse a dating culture focused on forming serious relationships and creating emotional connections.” In fact, these were consistently the top reasons listed for wanting to date. 

So then, why the drastic dating drought among young men and women? One large issue is self-doubt. The good news is these stated reasons can easily be overcome.

Sadly, only 25% of young adults — 29% of men and 21% of women — reported feeling “confident when approaching someone I’m interested in.” Just 38% of respondents believe “I am attractive to potential dating partners,” which was 39% of men and 37% of women.

And merely 37% said “I trust my judgement when it comes to choosing a romantic partner.” Men were only slightly more likely to say this than women. And only 28% — 31% of men and 25% of women — were able to stay positive after a bad date or a relationship setback.

When it comes to basic human behavior on a date, the responses were equally discouraging.

Only 34% said they were comfortable discussing their feelings with a potential dating partner; 35% of men and 32% of women confessed this. Remarkably, only 42% felt “good at managing my emotions on a date” and just 36% admitted being “good at picking up on social cues when dating.” Men and women were similar on the “managing emotions” response, but only 33% of guys felt keen on discerning social cues, while 39% of women said they were.

More than a third of this sample agreed they are likely to end a relationship too quickly in order to avoid heartbreak. Self-doubt is what’s prohibiting successful dating.

But the largest barrier to dating was feeling one did not have “enough money for dating activities.” Fifty-eight percent of men expressed this, while curiously, 47% of women did.

The great news is that these are all very fixable problems because they issue from perspective and perception. Men need to realize women are more interested in a creatively thoughtful date than an expensive one. Basic dating education is the solution, as the dating crisis is one of creativity and confidence. Clearly, our nations’ young adults — and likely young adults in most other parts of the world — need older adults and peers to come alongside and talk them through their fears about being a good dating partner.

Sadly, Gallup tells us a small minority of parents (19%) talk with their teen and young adult children about romantic relationships with any regularity. This needs to change as young adults welcome this advice and encouragement from parents.

Will we step up and help fix our current dating problem? We must, as civilization’s tomorrow rests upon boy approaching and meeting girl today! That is the natural human process and a blessing that God has given us.

Related Articles and Resources:

New Study: Online Dating Produces Fewer Healthy Relationships

Young Person Explains Why Young People Aren’t Getting Married

Who Falls in Love Faster, Men or Women?

Make Dating for Marriage Great Again

Don’t Believe the Modern Myth. Marriage Remains Good for Men

Important New Research on How Married Parents Improve Child Well-Being

How Marriage Fights Against Deaths of Despair

New Research: Marriage Still Provides Major Happiness Premium

Harvard Evolutionary Biologist Brilliantly Explains Necessity of Monogamous Marriage