Meeting someone through online dating

Verified by Psychology Today. Online dating has, for many, become a mainstay of meeting new potential romantic partners, whether looking for casual dating, serious dating, or even a marital partner. Until relatively recently, people met potential partners through friends, family, school, and other shared activities. According to research by Rosenfeld and Thomas , internet dating steadily increased, reaching a plateau in

You're scrolling through your Facebook and Instagram feed and what do you see? Photo after photo of your friend's new boyfriend, your sister's kids and engagement statuses from those high school sweethearts you grew up with. You roll your eyes and move on but you might also catch yourself wondering why you're single, and when you're going to find your match. The good news is: there are a lot of single people in America. But how are your friends finding relationships beyond a Netflix subscription? Maybe they met their significant other online.

And, online dating is more important to those in the LGBT community, he revealed: "That's even more true in homosexual relationships, a huge 75 per cent tend to begin online. The usual explanation is the population density is far lower, so these individuals are far more likely to turn to an online platform to meet someone from the next town across. It also seems to be a regional thing, for those who struggle to find like-minded people: "If you're gay in somewhere like Scotland or the Southwest of England these apps are incredibly useful for meeting your own community where you live. This has resulted in an explosion of niche dating apps, that have become more popular even under the shadow of behemoths like Match, Tinder , and eHarmony.

Life has been disrupted by technology, and so has dating. What else can we learn about how romance has changed? I have been a little bit surprised at how much the internet has displaced friends. Will everyone meet this way in the future?