What is it that makes a culture unique? How are whites, blacks, Asians, or whoever different from everybody else? What tastes, interests, and concepts define an ethnic group? And is there any way to make fun of other races in public and get away with it?
These are big questions, and here's how we answered them.
We selected 526,000 OkCupid users at random and divided them into groups by their (self-stated) race. We then took all these people's profile essays (280 million words in total!) and isolated the words and phrases that made each racial group's essays statistically distinct from the others'.
For instance, it turns out that all kinds of people list sushi as one of their favorite foods. But Asians are the only group who also list sashimi; it's a racial outlier. Similarly, as we shall see, black people are 20 times more likely than everyone else to mention soul food, whereas no foods are distinct for white people, unless you count diet coke.

Using this kind of analysis, we were able find the interests, hobbies, tastes, and self-descriptions that are specially important to each racial group, as determined by the words of the group itself. The information in this article is not our opinion. It's data, aggregated from the essays of half a million real people.
So here's the real stuff white people like.
Click on the icons to toggle between men/women.
In general, I won't comment too much on these lists, because the whole point of this piece is to let the groups speak for themselves, but I have to say that the mind of the white man is the world's greatest sausagefest. Unless you're counting Queens of the Stone Age, there is not even one vaguely feminine thing on his list, and as far as broad categories go we have: sweaty guitar rock, bro-on-bro comedies, things with engines, and dystopias.
As for the interests of white women, you have romance novels, some country music, and a broad selection of Good Housekeeping type stuff. It's also amazing the extent to which their list shows a pastoral or rural self-mythology: bonfires, boating, horseback riding, thunderstorms. I remind you that OkCupid's user base is almost all in large cities, where to one degree or another, if you find yourself doing much of any of these things, civilization has come to an end.
If I had to choose over-arching themes for white people's lists, for men, I'd go with "frat house" and for women, "escapism." Whether one begot the other is a question I'll leave to the reader.
Stuff black people like.
Hopefully it's been obvious that the font-size of a phrase indicates the relative frequency with which it appears. So, toggling between black men and black women above, you can see that while soul food is important to both, it's really, really important to the women. In fact, soul food and black women is the single strongest phrase/group pair we found.
The above lists also make it clear that, regardless of whether Jesus himself was black, his most vocal followers definitely are. Religious expressions weren't among the top phrases for any of the other races, but they're all over the place for black men and (especially) black women, for whom 13 of the top 50 phrases are religious. Black people are more than twice as likely than average to mention their faith in their profiles.

Finally, it's worth noting that of the four lists we've seen so far, black women's is the only one to explicitly include someone of another race: Justin Timberlake.
Double finally, how bold is it that I am cool is the second most typical phrase for black men?
OkTrends Racial Stereotype #1
In the course of researching this article and, in particular, comparing white guys to black guys, a handy shortcut occurred to me:
If you're trying to figure out if white dudes like something, put fucking in the middle, and say it out loud. If it sounds totally badass, white dudes probably love it. Let's see this principle in practice:

Stuff Latinos like.
Music and dancing—merengue, bachata, reggaeton, salsa—are obviously very important to Latinos of both genders. The men have two other fascinating things going on: an interest in telling you about their sense of humor (i'm a funny guy, very funny, outgoing and funny, etc.) and an interest in industrial strength ass-kicking (mma, ufc, boxing, marines, etc.) Basically, if a Latin dude tells you a joke, you should laugh.
OkTrends Racial Stereotype #2
El chiste de knock-knock:

Latinas' interests are fairly typical for a dating site: you got friends, career, education, movies, music, a few physical details, and, oh yeah...morbid fear. We dug further into I'm terrified of (on their list at #42) and found which words typically came next. It's mostly insects and "the dark", though one expert tautologist is "terrified of being scared" and another woman is "terrified of Martians."
Stuff Asians like.
As you can see, both Asian men and women choose I'm simple as their go-to self-description. Contrast this to black men's I am cool and Latinos' I'm a funny guy. It's also interesting that Asian men very often mention their specific heritage (taiwan, korea, singapore, vietnam, china) while Asian women don't.
OkTrends Racial Stereotype #3
Combing through these lists, you can see the different ways women use cosmetics:
- White women show off their eyes (mascara is #5 on their list).
- Black women show off their lips (lip gloss, #7).
- Latinas show off both (mascara, #18 / lip gloss, #22).
- Asian women, however, show off their practicality (lip balm, #48).
So far, I've gone through racial groups in order of their prominence on OkCupid. For brevity (I know this is the internet), I'll present the remaining lists without foolish commentary. You can click any of the links to reveal them inline.
Stuff Indians like.
Stuff Middle Easterners like.
Stuff Pacific Islanders like.
We'll be revisiting race later this month, with a statistical investigation of interracial dating, and we're almost finished with the article on (bi-)sexuality we promised last time. Thanks for reading, everyone.
Till next time,

It’s always interesting seeing these studies, but they could be made more useful if raw numbers were added to classes to give some clue as to relative significance overall. With religion, how does the “other” category break down? Has OKC ever considered that some people have multiple religious identifications, or that “laughing about” and “serious” can coexist?
Past blog topic “The Big Lies People Tell In Online Dating” is the number one search hit caption if anyone finds over a million OKC hits searching “bisexual” at this domain. It’d be interesting to see that defamatory quirk of search engine algorithms addressed in the upcoming topic.
The obvious “fucking” in the middle phrase seemed to be missing in this piece. Google finds 340 hits for “Jesus fucking christ” on OKC, but zero for any of the examples used (except for one on Alicia Keys in a comment here). Not exactly common with so many users, but how are those hits distributed among people for whom Jesus is a religious figure, those annoyed at obnoxious evangelicals, and mere nonreligious exclamations?
Why is it even possible to use Google or other search engines for a broad review of OKC profile and secondary pages? They should be blocked for those who’ve chosen the option to allow viewing by other logged in OKC’ers only, a security and privacy function that seems to have been lost in one of the major site “upgrades”.
Prompted by a journal thread, I ran Google searches of the 16 primary Meyers-Briggs and Keirsey types with this: [profile test [type] site:okcupid.com] In over 80,000 hits, rational personalities were represented about double the normal frequency in society, no surprise. However, there was a huge spike in ISTP’s (over 19,000). It might be interesting to do a more detailed review, that focuses on the serious MBTI and Keirsey test results, and traps duplicates for a given user, or short form test variants.
Is managing OKC like a candy shop for Harvard math majors interested in statistics about fellow humans?
What a great way to create segregation, judgement, hate, lies and negative thinking. I don’t believe 95% of what I read. A dating profile doesn’t sum a person up. Meeting them and getting to know them sums a person up! I hope others are smart enough to realize what crap this is. Misusing unsuspecting people’s dating profiles…. Can’t wait for the day negative people stop separating us as humans. And where is Dave Chapelle in all of this. EVERYONE loves him!
Extremely fascinating!
As an international member I’d like to see statistics based maybe on location, or location AND self proclaimed ethnic group. While group culture is real, “race” is not. It’s by and large something used to describe the way people look. Latin Americans, for example, probably have really different interests than those in South America, who are probably underrepresented on this site. Same with “Asians” who were born in Asia and “Asian-Americans” who are all clearly from “the Bay.” Maybe hometown would be a better indicator than location.
Reading the comments was almost as entertaining as the article!
I’m happy I don’t fit it with my box.
what bout mixed ppl?
Dang! Judging by what other people like – I have no race! I don’t belong anywhere! I am devastated!!
To everyone complaining about stereotypes, complain to the insane number of people that choose to fit those stereotypes. As an avid internet user for 12 years, these are things I’ve noticed back in the days of chat rooms, I saw it continue in blogs, and now social networking sites and Twitter. I don’t think it’s a racial thing, but definately a cultural thing. Face it, in a culture that doesn’t value education (ghetto culture) the level of education shown in writing is startlingly low!
Same goes for religious people vs atheists (and I’ll back up the person stating that most people with high IQs don’t need religion, studies have repeatedly expressed this. People with low IQs and less education need religion more).
People, do you dislike stereotypes? Stop living up to them. If you don’t live up to them, good for you. But accept the fact that you are not the norm.
what about “Stuff Mixed Race People Like”??
CHUCK FUCKING NORRIS
Dude, I love this post –I wish more sites would use their reams of interesting user data for fun stuff like this rather than just selling them to advertisers.
I feel guilty for thinking “I thought so!” at some of this stuff…
Well, for being a white guy, I conform with just 5 of the 50 things I’m supposed to like. That either means that I’m exceptional, or that white guys are lamer than I feared. Maybe both.
Oh — and atheism isn’t a belief or a “faith based system”; it’s the absence of either. I would’ve been interested to see how belief/lack of belief correspond to ethnicity. My guess is that blacks and Hispanics would be most religious and whites or Asians would be least.
Latina women are “scared of”… but also list “scary movies”. Huhn.
Who is “Charles Dawkins”? A conflation of Charles Darwin and Richard Dawkins that is actually mentioned as often as “friends” in the profiles of Middle Eastern men? I find it hard to believe so many people make the same strange mistake.
I find this very amusing and thought provoking. However, a comment like this of course has to come in to question: “Wow…so you racially profiled your site…good job…just what the world needs, another thing to point out stereotypical differences between people.”
Seriously. Is it really a stereotype when it’s being graphed and proven by the very people living the stereotypes? Does it even matter if it’s a stereotype? Yes, it’s a stereotype that black women tend to be more religious and into gospel. Who cares? These black women are proud of it, so apparently it’s not a negative thing.
Be proud of who you are, stereotype or not. If you don’t like the stereotype that you fit into which seems to be upsetting you so much, then change that part of yourself you seem so ashamed of.
You know what fuck your site and this racist post. You god hating racist son of a bitch. How’s that for grammar.
Dear OKCupid,
How is this News For Nerds on Slashdot.org? This is one
of few reasons I left Plenty Off-ish because the accounting
data is being shared by GOOGLE-ANALYTICS to steal
information into the ex-CIA-employee corporation GOOGLE.
Some of these websites are geared for SOCIALIZING as well
as Dating, as what I used another for.
I hope you and Google get NUKED FROM ORBIT by my friend
Anon in /new/ on 4Chan.
So, what’s the real difference between an 8th and a 9th grade reading level? Is that like where you stop reading Harry Potter and pick up New Moon? LOL.
Very curious about the effects of multiracial people, correlated back to their respective ‘monoracial’ peers. Also, which groups (racial or otherwise) most resemble each other under this analysis… Maybe something to pursue with the interracial dating bit?
Chris, since your analysis is based on the term frequencies from the entire sample set of 500k+ members / the TF for members in a particular race, was the sample set balanced to make sure each race is equally represented in the analysis.
If the sample set was not balanced, the analysis would be more about what unique words are used exclusively by a race rather than importance. Take the example of Africa American users, Soul Food is supposedly the most important term mentioned in their profile. Based on your research technique, it would mean that “soul food” is a term that is used primarily by African American users. But it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the most important does it? Perhaps the African AMerican users mentions “Van Halen” just as much as “soul food”. But if there are significantly more Caucasian users than other races, the results would be skewed.
It seems a TF/IDF approach for each race would produce more accurate results. Funny stuff nevertheless.
Christian–You are a f****n’ genius. You just might have identified why the divorce rate is so high, especially among us white people. Looking at the two lists, how on earth would anyone expect men and women to have enough similar interests to be interested in each other? Truly, men and women are from different planets.
What about stuff *gay* people like? That would be awesome!
I think it would be interesting if you guys could do one that is more focused on the different ethnic groups that are so often pushed to the side and labeled as white, black, latino, asian etc people . Obviously, not all white girls aren’t going to like Ireland if they’re not of Irish decent. Surely there has to be some differences between the interests of African people (like really from Africa) living in the US and Black people. Like for example, a lot of African people express their disdain towards anything fried and greasy.
Alas I finally see. everywhere, ‘tards.
Is Satan lowering the standards of the Earth, so that everyone is
a “Nerd” now for doing nothing useful or collecting college degrees
like a sarcastic body odor?
I realized from this that I should either be or be with a Latina Asian chick instead of a white chick. Holy shit. Profound stuff. Pass the hookah?
@Atheisto, it doesn’t say attends church. It says atheists who take their religious views more seriously. Like those who would be less inclined towards dating people with other views. It’s basically asking if religion is a deal breaker. So the most serious atheists and agnostics would be the least likely to attend services whereas the most serious other religion folks would be the most.
And it doesn’t measure intelligence it measures rather specifically vocabulary and writing sophistication by way of a rather standard test. How big of words do you use? So the very nominal Buddhists use the biggest words followed by the atheists who take their atheism seriously.
Wow, this is fascinating stuff! I’m VERY interested in statistics (part of my job and I really love it), provided no one gets offended by the statistics and just reads them for the interesting data they offer,
I think that most commenters here have been very mature and seem to have understood the method used, but I worry that a lot of visitors will feel hurt or offended by what they see as stereotypes. I want to briefly share my point of view on this.
For one thing, this was a simple word count; it is possible that many instances of these phrases were taken out of context. The profiles could have been mentioning these topics as jokes, or even listing things they dislike to directly contradict some stereotypes. Or, perhaps they were not truthfully or accurately describing their own preferences, but rather using topics they thought would catch the eye of the girls and boys they like; or maybe they simply wrote what came to mind first. Writing a “profile” of yourself is not that easy.
But, even with all those situations accounted for, there is nothing unfair or unkind about admitting that people in these different groups do have somewhat different tastes. Each culture has it’s own way of looking at things, often as a result of geographical predispositions as well as genetic ones. In our modern world we sometimes forget that geography played and still plays a huge role in the compromises people must make in order to get along. But try to remember that not all these inclinations are evidence of inborn differences in the brain; many of them are consequences of traditions that were learned after birth. It’s a wonderful thing that humans have learned how to prosper in so many different climates, and that’s just one of the ways that diversity creates strength for those who know how to embrace it.
Although we all try to be unbiased, many of us have struggled with questions of what to do with the observations we make about tendencies among different races. Personally I believe that there is such a thing as being too politically correct. To me it makes sense to notice and appreciate the ‘stuff white people like’, as it were, and the stuff every group likes, but to not assume that every person of that color or creed will live up to that expectation. It’s not that hard to have an open mind when you learn all the cool things that people of all types will tell you if you know how to show respect for them and listen.
I know some people say that you should ignore your brain’s attempts to categorize folks, but to me that’s dangerous because your subconscious will notice those patterns anyway and if you’re not aware of it then it can trick you. Don’t pretend that you “don’t see color”; it’s a difficult balancing act to see people as individuals and not just a sum of demographics, but in my opinion you can do a better job if you let your brain be honest with itself.
Okay, I said it would be brief, but with such a sensitive topic I wanted to be as clear as I could. I feel pretty strongly that we can better show respect for each other if we leave the political correctness and the taboos behind. Instead of getting touchy about being stereotyped, just take responsibility for yourself and try to remember that everyone else is doing their best too. I think science like this can help us relax and admit that not everyone is the same; but we also have to stay on our toes and remember that there is a lot more individuality than the science sees!
Why does it appear on almost all men groups the sentence “World War Z”?
Who knew statistics could be fun? Sure, the project violates basically all the prepositions for statistical treatment, but it’s FUN! Way better than the other way around.
Where’s the pan-study comparing different social sites/media?
(Am I the only one who thinks that “Alicia Fucking Keys” does actually sound sort of bad-ass?)
Finally vindication that Run-on-sentences and missing punctuation indicates a higher writing proficiency . ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleman-Liau_Index ) I love statistics, but they are only statistics, ie…not predictive of any individual.
A fun result. I think the Latinos sound the most positive bunch with their like for dance and positive things showing up.
Re: AJ – Lighten up.
“For instance, it turns out that all kinds of people list sushi as one of their favorite foods. But Asians are the only group who also list sashimi;”
Probably because Asians know the difference. What most people call “sushi” actually are sashimi….
@AJ
Are you dumb or what ?
These are not “racial stereotypes”, these are hard facts gleaned from a large dataset. If 99% of blacks like fried chicken, it’s NOT stereo-typing … that implies taking a trait seen in the minority and applying it to the majority.
If *I* was black, would I like fried chicken ? Probably, based on all the statistic evidence. There’s a hell of a difference between saying “ALL of group likes X”, and saying “MOST of group likes X”.
Why must people always see racism when NONE exists ?
Brilliant stuff. Especially the comments and summaries.
Got a lot more serious with the last two graphs; loved those for their content.
I just wanted to point out that in the commentary you mention that black women are the only ones who specifically mention a non black in their words (justin timberlake) but the middle eastern women do too. In their frequency list Nina Simone is listed and she is a Black Woman singer who is deceased. and also, almost every group seems to mention alicia keys so does she not count because she is half white/half black so you didnt know what category to put her in? ( as far one ethnic group specifically mentioning someone who is not of that group)
Nice article! Could you please also do this for different continents? For instance if I as an European say “cool” to a story somebody tells me I don’t mean “I’m not interested, but look like”, so use completely other words than peeps from the US. I notice a lot more differences between different kind of white, which are more a result of cultural/contental differences than race.
please do try to look at GLBT as well, i am sure we will learn quite a deal there as well
I am surprised Nascar is so popular with white women.
I, too, would like to see something on non-heterosexuals in each category; I also think the results would be quite significantly different. Also, it’s worth noting to what extent these statistics show the American-weighted bias of OKCupid as a site. For example one can clearly see from the common phrases how most Middle Easterners and Indians in the US tend to be middle class engineering and finance types, very much unlike what is the case among the same groups in Europe and the UK, let alone in their home (sub)continents. Same thing with the black results, which are strongly oriented towards things important to American blacks rather than, say, the Caribbean-descended blacks in the UK.
Interest indeed!
So in the end, whites like the great outdoors, blacks like music, Latins are a mixture of both and religion has destroyed all of their reading/writing levels.
The world is screwed up, seriously.
Like it or not, it’s a true representation of the cross section of people using the service. Of course we don’t all fit into the categories perfectly but it is not stereotyping either. It is what it is. I doubt the answers are all true though. I know for a fact that a majority of people who say they are religious rarely follow religious principles so are they really religious. I believe the Atheists though.
i want to date a middle eastern lady. they eclectic and super cool.
Fascinating—particularly the chart of writing proficiency by religion. I’m not terribly surprised though. For many, religion is substitute for education. Religion is largely doctrinal, and has the effect of inhibiting erstwhile critical thinking and analysis.
What is “Coz”?
Fascinating—particularly the chart of writing proficiency by religion. I’m not terribly surprised though. For many, religion is substitute for education. I’d suspect there are two reasons for this: First of all, less intelligent people are inherently more likely to be superstitious, because they lack the ability and patience required to find real answers. Secondly, once a doctrinal way of thinking has been established in a person’s mind, it has the effect of inhibiting erstwhile critical thinking and analysis.
This is the first article in the OKCupid trends series that I have read and it makes me want to read more of the series. Very fascinating and entertaining: I love you data-hungry OKC geeks.
I’m not getting any dates here, so I am doubly glad that, at least, I am getting infotainment.
Does anyone know what “coz” is in the Asian woman’s profile?
I’m assuming it’s not just the word “because” … since it would have been filtered out – and also it doesn’t appear anywhere else. Google was of no help.
Funny though – despite me being a white man (European) that has a weakness for Asian cultures, the biggest similarities I find with the black man group… to which I have next to no contact.
alicia keys should be pleased by these results