Online dating came along just at the right time – a magical solution for a world where many people now spend long periods of their lives unwillingly unattached.Having started out as one of Australia’s first sex therapists, journalist and author Bettina Arndt is now our country’s first online dating coach, helping men and women navigate internet dating. Arndt has fascinating insights into the mysteries of this new means of matchmaking. Bettina Arndt addressed The Sydney Institute on Wednesday 30 July 2014 to give some insights into a new sociological phenomenon in relationships.

THE SOCIOLOGY OF ONLINE DATING

BETTINA ARNDT

It wasn’t so long ago that our social world was dominated by couples. Back in the 1950s, most people still married early, and long marriages were the norm, with relatively few divorces. But then, the 1960s heralded in a new era where most people spent considerable periods of their lives single. Not desperate and dateless but certainly unattached.

It was the women’s movement, the arrival of the Pill and the so called “sexual revolution” which lead to a huge shift in the age of first marriage. Now most young people don’t think of marrying until they hit their late twenties and that means plenty still looking for a mate at an age when their parents had been married a good five to ten years. We now start our adult lives with decade of dating – most young folk now spend up to ten years single, in and out of various attachments.

Many remain unmarried through to their forties – for instance, the number of partnerless women in their 30s has almost doubled since 1986. Then they are joined by floods of divorced people eager to sign up for the second marriage market. And finally there’s the ageing baby boomer generation which now contains increasing numbers of singles – a mix of never-married, divorced and widowed.

So what we have now is a new social world where huge numbers are single for long periods – with many keen not to stay that way. But, hallelujah – magically there has emerged a solution to their desire to meet new partners. Modern technology has come to their aid with internet dating offering an amazingly efficient way of bringing these hoards of circulating singles together. Over the last two decades internet matchmaking arrived with a vengeance – and is proving mighty successful.

People often talk about how online dating compares to dating in the “real world” but for many of these singles their choice is between online dating and no dating. Most single people I meet, particularly those over forty, report they rarely meet other eligible singles – online dating is the only way more of these large groups of singles are actually given the opportunity to interact.

The overall figures are staggering with up to 1200 people each day signing up as members of the largest site, RSVP. There’s no independent way of checking membership figures but both RSVP and eHarmony claim two million members and over four million have apparently joined RSVP since it was launched seventeen years ago. Nielson research last year found most Australians (51 per cent) had either tried online dating or would consider doing so.

Ten years ago online dating was dominated by people in their thirties and forties but recently been a move for more baby boomers to come online as well as more younger singles, according to an RSVP spokesperson. In June 2013, 11 per cent of RSVP’s over two million members were over 55 with a similar percentage now 18-24. The largest group of members is aged 25-34 – 33 per cent, followed by 35-44 (26 per cent) and then 45-55 (19 per cent).

Just as many men as women are joining the major websites overall but eHarmony acknowledges more female members than male in all age groups over 35 – reflecting the gender split amongst singles in the overall population. The latest 2011 Australian census figures show more unpartnered women than men in all ages over 35 – for 45-54 year olds there are nearly 70,000 more single women than single men.

So where are the men?

That’s a fascinating thing – here’s this huge pool of singles but in every age group over 35 there are more single women than men. Where are the men? That’s a question I hear constantly since I started working as an online dating coach. Sydney women grumble the problem must be all the gay men who flock to this tolerant city – but there’s no reason to think there aren’t just as many gay women living here.

No, the real story of the disappearing men is far more complex and interesting. For a start the problem is one of fit. Most often we hear stories from better educated, professional women who are struggling to find enough men to match them.

Look at the statistics. Almost one in three women aged 30 to 34 and a quarter of late-30s women do not have a partner, according to the 2006 census statistics. And this is a growing problem. The number of partnerless women in their 30s has almost doubled since 1986.

The challenge is greatest for high-achieving women in their 30s looking for equally successful men. Analysis of 2006 census figures by the Monash University sociologist, Genevieve Heard, reveals that almost one in four of degree-educated women in their 30s will miss out on a man of similar age and educational achievement. There were only 68,000 unattached graduate men in their 30s for 88,000 single graduate women in the same age group.

And the higher-education gap keeps widening. In the past year, the proportion of degree-educated women aged 25 to 34 rose from 37.7 per cent to 40.3 per cent, according to the Bureau of Statistics, while for males the figure remained below 30 per cent, having risen only 0.5 per cent in the past year.

Although there are similar numbers of single men and women in their 30s overall – about 370,000 of each across Australia – half these available men had only high school education, 57 per cent earned $42,000 or less and 95,000 of them were unemployed. So the women who struggle most to find eligible men are the crème of the crop whilst the men most likely to remain single are the marginal men – ill-educated and often unemployed.

But there’s another interesting aspect to all of this – rarely publicly discussed except on male blogger’s sites collectively described as the ‘‘manosphere’’. (Some of these sites make for alarmingly misogynist reading but their uniquely male perspective does often ring true.)

Theses bloggers suggest the man shortage problem women in their thirties are confronting is a direct result of the decision – which they argue is led by women – to delay settling down until their late twenties.

Here’s Dalrock (dalrock.wordpress.com): “Today’s unmarried 20-something women have given men an ultimatum: I’ll marry when I’m ready, take it or leave it. This is of course their right. But ultimatums are a risky thing, because there is always a possibility the other side will decide to leave it. In the next decade we will witness the end result of this game of marriage chicken.”

So the argument is that during their twenties many women let good men slip through their fingers because they are not ready to settle down. The American journalist Kate Bolick wrote recently in The Atlantic about breaking off her three-year relationship with a man she describes as “intelligent, good-looking, loyal and kind”. She acknowledges now that “there was no good reason to end things” yet at the time she was convinced something was missing. That was 11 years ago. She’s now 39 and facing grim choices.

“We arrived at the top of the staircase,’’ she wrote, ‘‘finally ready to start our lives, only to discover a cavernous room at the tail end of a party, most of the men gone already, some having never shown up – and those who remain are leering by the cheese table, or are, you know, the ones you don’t want to go out with.”

The reason the men she is looking for – successful “Alpha” males – are so rarely available is by failing to tie them down at an earlier age means that by the time they hit thirty they now face plenty of choices. They don’t need to just choose from the thirties women suddenly so keen on their company.

Many choose instead to fish outside their pond, some choosing younger women and others find partners who offer something other than career success. Some doctors still marry nurses, and lawyers their secretaries. The most attractive, successful men can take their pick from women their own age or younger women who are happy to settle early. Almost one in three degree-educated 35 year-old men marry or live with women aged 30 or under, according to ABS statistics.

So this is the game of marriage chicken Dalrock is writing about – and men have emerged the winners. It’s an interesting theory.

Men in a buyers’ market

Faced with these grim statistics women gradually started to join the fledging online dating sites over a decade ago which at that time were dominated by male customers. When RSVP started in 1997 males outnumbered females almost two to one and it was rare for women to make the first contact with prospective partners. Since then more women have signed up in all age groups with many discovering they need to approach the men to achieve the best results.

The older the men get, the more the odds are stacked in their favour – 2006 census figures show 68,000 more single women than men in their fifties. Only 13 per cent of these men have degrees, less than half the number of tertiary-educated women. Many older men revel in finding themselves in a buyer’s market, on the receiving end of a lot of female attention (and some behave very badly!) One successful Sydney academic told me that he had been on eHarmony on three separate periods of three months and receive approximately 600-700 matches each period.

With more dating sites starting up all the time, choices can seem overwhelming. There are now dozens of sites in Australia, including many for sex hook-ups, and a rash of new ones targeting specific groups like the over 50s, usually attracting too small numbers to be really effective. People most in demand – the young and good-looking and well-educated, successful men – are likely to get lots of attention on most sites, from free ones like OK Cupid and Plenty of Fish, to the latest craze for the younger set, the smartphone app Tinder.

The Tinder app offers a heterosexual version of Grindr, a hook-up app which allows gays to check out local action. With Tinder potential matches living locally are judged hot or not – on the basis of a photo and perhaps a tagline or two – and with a flick of the finger accepted or discarded. This has now become the dating site of choice for the younger set particularly, working well to bring people together and resulting in many matches.

There’s also growing numbers of introduction agencies charging huge fees to match their own customers, some are brand new, others have been around for over 20 years. I’m extremely concerned about the number of women coming to me for online dating advice who have paid up thousands of dollars to these services only to find they can’t come up with anything like the promised number of matches. The simple fact is that these companies can’t operate a legitimate business anymore because they can’t attract enough men. Why would a man pay up to $2-8,000 to one of these companies when he can go online and meet plenty of women? Yet women who are nervous of online dating or finding it too hard to handle are still handing over serious money to these people. It’s a real scandal.

Our consumer complaints organisations receive a steady stream of complaints about these organizations. Last year the NSW Department of Fair Trading received 86 complaints about introduction agencies, including some of the really big names in the business. Of these 36 of the customers got their money back, at least in part.

Online dating is really the only place most older women are going to have a good chance of meeting men – but it still isn’t easy. These women need to choose their dating site carefully and make sure everything is working for them. This means graduate women must find a website with the largest possible pool of these highly eligible men – less likely to be found on the free sites – and one where they choose their own search criteria to find the best prospects. In Australia, the obvious choice is RSVP since eHarmony doesn’t allow members to search but rather provides members with matches based on personality tests. RSVP also enables members to remain anonymous by hiding profile photos, a major attraction for women in big jobs nervous about their public reputations.

Older women can do well online but they need to get everything right. They need to stand out from the crowd with interesting profiles and great photos, they must be willing to approach men rather than wait to be asked, and cope with the inevitable rejection that is part of the process. Often they need help in getting all this right – which is where my work as an online dating coach often proves useful. But one of toughest aspects of my job is helping women to become more realistic about their market value. Often they have quite unrealistic expectations about the type of man they are likely to attract. It isn’t easy getting them to cut back their shopping lists and think through what really matters when it comes to finding the right man – they have no hope of finding a man who ticks all their boxes.

Having said all that, I should point out that there are many women living solo who are happy to stay that way. One consequence of so many people spending periods in their lives living alone is many discover they are perfectly happy and may even prefer being on their own. This seems to apply particularly to women who are more likely to be able to create a comfortable home, have a good network of friends and are very resistant to finding themselves once again living with a man who drives them crazy. That’s different from the situation of many men who crave cosy domesticity and live isolated lives. Men are always complaining to me that even though women face stiff competition they are still mighty picky. True enough.

All the men are broke!

Speaking of women and their long shopping lists… top of these list for many older divorced women is financial security. I’m dealing with a lot of professional women earning a good income and sitting pretty with their own homes. They prefer a man who can match their assets, but there simply aren’t enough to go around.

“All the men are broke!” they moan, as they nervously protect their nest-eggs. Financial solvency is right up there on these older women’s wish list for prospective partners – outranking attractions such as height, hair and potency. (In the Age of Viagra, the latter is rarely the problem it used to be for the aging suitor.)

Well, not all are broke…but many older divorced men are struggling. Contrary to common assumptions, older divorced women are on average more financially secure than older divorced men. David de Vaus and colleagues from the Australian Institute of Family Studies in 2007 used data from HILDA (Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey) to compare divorced women and men aged 55-74 and found half the females owned a house compared to 41 per cent of the males. The average household income of the women was also higher and just under half the older divorced men were renting compared with about a third of the women. Superannuation was the one area where male assets outstrip the females – the sorry state of older women’s superannuation is a story that attracts constant attention.

Yes, there are many single, older women doing it tough – just as there are men. But the constant attention to women at the bottom means a big story is overlooked; the financial mismatch at the upper end of the older dating market.

Of course there is a pool of mature-aged single men with deep pockets out there. Dr Genevieve Heard from Monash’s School of Social & Political Inquiry used 2011 Census data to reveal that there are more divorced men than women aged 50-70 in the top household income bracket (that is, $104,000 or more per year) – 17,100 compared to 10,400. But like Rolls Royces in a knockdown sale, these men are snapped up as soon as they hit the market. Their friends usually have swarms of single women lining up to meet them.

The surprise though is that in every income bracket below this one, older women outnumber the men. Heard’s analysis shows there are 82,300 divorced women and only 67,400 divorced men aged 50-70 with a yearly household income of between $52,000 and $104,000. This census data also shows a huge gap in the numbers of 50-70 year-old divorced women and men who own or are paying off a house – 291,000 women compared to 195,100 men. That’s almost 100,000 more women than men.

The financial gap is real and there are repercussions in the dating world. Women’s concern about protecting their assets makes them hyper-alert to any hint of an impecunious man, like reticence to pay for that first drink or coffee. Most men are very conscious of being financially screened from the very first meeting; a financial consultant mentions the unseemly eagerness of one date to escape as soon as he mentioned how tough it was getting new work.

Yet it’s so easy to assume that a man who doesn’t shape up financially must be a loser. How often does it occur to women – myself included – that maybe we might have something to do with the plight of these older men?

Divorce is a growing hazard for older married men. The percentage of divorces involving men over fifty more than doubled between 1985 and 2010 – leaping from 11 to 22 per cent for men in their fifties and 4 to 10 per cent for men aged 60 plus. A Family Court study by Pauline Presland and Helen Gluckstern back in 1993 showed it was the women making the decision to leave in two-thirds of mature aged marital separations. After a long working life of building up their financial security, many rightly grumpy older men end up losing 60-70 per cent of their assets; homemaker wives or those on low incomes will often receive an extra 10 or 20 per cent above an even split because it’s assumed the high earning male will gain more from future earnings.

Yet in tough economic times these older professional men are very vulnerable to losing their jobs. The GFC was another major factor which led to many formerly affluent men having their remaining savings decimated.

Women joke about not wanting to end up “a nurse or a purse”, explaining their reluctance to take on a man they might need to support in any way. Yet many of us have had long periods in our lives being supported by a man so it is interesting how resistant we are to the notion that maybe now we might consider returning the favour. Phillip, 59, is a charming, funny Gold Coast engineer who readily admits his current financial crisis is due not just to his two ex-wives but his casual approach to running his previously extremely successful business. The taxman eventually caught up with him. He’s online dating and quite open about the fact that his new retirement plan involves finding a woman with a house ready to take him on: “I have already married two paupers who lived in fine state for many years. Is it unfair to expect that it is my turn?” Maybe he has a point?

The only game in town for singles

Online dating really works – most of the men and women I’ve been helping have been successful in meeting new people, starting new relationships. I’ve had a string of clients who are now in in-in partnerships and one has got married. But even if that doesn’t happen many make new friends, have the fun of getting dressed up to go out on dates and can find a nice warm hand to hold in a movie theatre. How bad as that?