Pew: Online dating more socially acceptable

Nearly 60 percent of Internet users say online dating is a good way to meet people, but only 1 in 10 admits to having used online or mobile dating services, according to a poll published Monday by Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project.

A 29-year-old master's student in New York City — a friend of this Al Jazeera reporter — found herself alone early Monday morning, eating leftovers, after what she called an unsuccessful second date with a 32-year-old IT professional she'd met on online dating site OkCupid.

"Nothing went that wrong, but I feel lukewarm," she said.

The two went to see a film, and she asked her German-born date if his grandparents had been Nazis. Despite the momentary awkwardness that ensued, the two ended up kissing outside the Whole Foods on the corner of Bowery and East Houston before she went home alone.

The young woman's experience of finding dates on the Internet has become more and more the norm in the past several years and has lost some of the stigma once associated with it: Fifty-nine percent of 2,252 respondents to the Pew survey said online dating is socially acceptable — up from 44 percent in 2005. Just 21 percent said users are "desperate" — down from 29 percent. And some 11 percent of people who started a long-term relationship in the past decade say they met their partner online. 

But it seems many who use online services may be holding back about it. The New York City woman said she preferred to remain anonymous because she would be too embarrassed to let others know she was meeting prospective boyfriends online.

"I think it's more socially acceptable now, but I think it's still a new platform that's on the fence. Even people who meet online and end up hitting it off will end up making up a story. Everyone wants to say that they met in person somehow. Everyone wants a cute story, even if it's bulls---."

If she were to meet her match on the Internet, she says she would tell people that she met him at the movies or through friends, for instance.

"Honestly, I think that finding someone in person is still a better option, but when you are busy in the city, you have to play the numbers game, and you have to go out with a bunch of people to find the right person. Online dating serves that purpose," the woman said.

She estimates that she responds to two of the roughly 30 men who contact her on OkCupid each month.

Many are looking for casual sex, she said. "Casual sex" is one of the options users can select for their profiles under the category "I'm looking for."

"I'd say like 10 (of the monthly 30) are just generic, like, 'Yo, baby what's up?'"

Despite what she called a lackluster rendezvous, she may go on another date with her gentleman caller, whom she said was "shorter than I would want him to be, but he has a nice face."

"With online dating, you judge people a little more superficially."

"He's a nice person ... With online dating, you have to give it a few tries, versus meeting someone in person, because you don't really get to know the person until a few dates," she said, adding that she would prefer if they turned into platonic "movie buddies."