The Big Lies People Tell In Online Dating

July 7th, 2010 by Christian Rudder

Nerds. As we all know, the Internet is a great place to pretend to be someone you're not. For instance, here's me in Second Life having a great time:

Anyhow, in many online situations, self-misrepresentation is totally harmless. Like, who cares if your Halo 3 avatar is taller than you are in real life? Or if flickr thinks you're single when you're really married? But in online dating, where the whole goal is to eventually meet other people in person, creating a false impression is a whole different deal.

People do everything they can in their OkCupid profiles to make themselves seem awesome, and surely many of our users genuinely are. But it's very hard for the casual browser to tell truth from fiction. With our behind-the-scenes perspective, we're able to shed some light on some typical claims and the likely realities behind them.

Let's get started.

"I'm 6 feet tall."

REALITY: People are two inches shorter in real life.

This whole post was inspired by an amusing graph we stumbled across while trying to answer the question Do taller guys have more sex? The answer, to a degree, is yes, and I'll expand on that in a little bit. But in this case what was more interesting than the sex was the (supposed) tallness of the guys.

The male heights on OkCupid very nearly follow the expected normal distribution—except the whole thing is shifted to the right of where it should be. You can see it better when we overlay the implied best fit below (pardon the technical language):

Almost universally guys like to add a couple inches. You can also see a more subtle vanity at work: starting at roughly 5' 8", the top of the dotted curve tilts even further rightward. This means that guys as they get closer to six feet round up a bit more than usual, stretching for that coveted psychological benchmark.

When we looked into the data for women, we were surprised to see height exaggeration was just as widespread, though without the lurch towards a benchmark height:

On a somewhat humbling personal note, I just went back and looked at my own profile, and apparently I list myself at 5' 11". Really, I'm a touch under 5' 10". Hmmm.

. . .

As for whether it even makes sense for people to make such an obvious and easily disproved exaggeration, the jury is out. We've found that taller people, up to a point, have more sex:

But as far as messages go, shorter women actually seem to get more attention:

These are the average weekly unsolicited message totals by height; you can think of these as the number of times a person is "hit on" out of the blue each week on OkCupid. a 5' 4" woman gets 60 more contacts each year than a six-footerThe genders are plotted on different scales because of the eternal fact that men almost always make the first move, so women get many more unsolicited messages.

It's plain from these two charts that women six feet or taller are either less attractive to men or are considered too intimidating to message. The data also raises the interesting possibility that these tall women are much more likely to sleep with a man who does approach them. Compare the 6' 0" woman to her 5' 4" counterpart: the taller woman gets hit on about two-thirds as much, yet has had slightly more sex partners.

"I make $100,000 a year."

REALITY: People are 20% poorer than they say they are.

Apparently, an online dater's imagination is the best performing mutual fund of the last 10 years. Here's what people are saying on OkCupid, versus what their incomes should be:

Use the slider to watch as people exaggerate more as they get older. As you can see, people advertise disproportionately high salaries for themselves. Just to pick a symbolic amount, there are consistently 4× the number of people making $100K a year than there should be.

Note that in formulating the "expected" lines for each age we were very careful to adjust for OkCupid's particular demographics: we compared every individual against the average not just by age but by zip code. Here a breakdown by gender of the exaggeration rates:

A woman may earn 76 cents on the dollar for the same work as a man, but she can fabricate, like, 85 cents no problem.

As a public service, we've decided to make our income calculations available. The following widget will calculate the statistically expected income of your potential matches; you give it a gender, an age, and a zip code, and it'll spit out a salary. Then you can confront your dates about exactly how much money they probably do or don't make. Fun!

. . .

We did a little investigating as to whether a person's stated income had any real effect on his or her online dating experience. Unsurprisingly, we found that it matters a lot, particularly for men. This is a by-age messaging distribution:

These bold colors contain a subtle message: if you're a young guy and don't make much money, cool. If you're 23 or older and don't make much money, go die in a fire. It's not hard to see where the incentive to exaggerate comes from.

"Here's a recent pic."

REALITY: The more attractive the picture, the more likely it is to be out-of-date.

The above picture, for example, was over two years old when it was uploaded. How do we know? Most modern cameras append text tags to the jpgs they take. These tags, called EXIF metadata, specify things like the exposure and f-stop settings, gps information if your camera has it, and, of course, the time and date the photo was taken. This is how programs like iPhoto know when (and sometimes where) you've taken your pictures.

Analyzing this stuff, we found that most of the pictures on OkCupid were of recent vintage; site-wide the median photo age at upload was just 92 days. However, hotter photos were much more likely to be outdated than normal ones. Here's a comparison (the age of a picture below is how old it was when it was uploaded to our site):

As you can see, over a third of the hottest photos on the site are a year old or more. And more than twice as many hot photos are over three years old (12%) as average-looking ones (5%), which makes sense because people are more inclined to cling to the pics that make them look their best

Another useful (if somewhat unorthodox) way to take in this graph is to follow the horizontal gridlines. If you trace out from "20%", for example, you can see that 1 in 5 average-looking photos is at least a year old, meanwhile, among the hot photos, nearly 1 in 5 is at least two years old.

It also turns out that older people also upload older photos:

The upshot here is, if you see a good-looking picture of a man over 30, that photo is very likely to be out-of-date. Not to get personal again, but my own OkCupid photo shows a Burberry-dressed 27 year-old, strumming away on his guitar. Meanwhile, I turn 35 in a couple months and am writing this post in the same shorts and tee-shirt I've been wearing for a week. Time waits for no man, unless that man doesn't update his personal information.

"I'm bisexual."

REALITY: 80% of self-identified bisexuals are only interested in one gender.

OkCupid is a gay- and bi-friendly place and it's not our intention here to call into question anyone's sexual identity. But when we looked into messaging trends by sexuality, we were very surprised at what we found. People who describe themselves as bisexual overwhelmingly message either one sex or the other, not both as you might expect. Site-wide, here's how it breaks out:

This suggests that bisexuality is often either a hedge for gay people or a label adopted by straights to appear more sexually adventurous to their (straight) matches. You can actually see these trends in action in the chart below.

Again, this is just the data we've collected. We'd be very interested in our bisexual users' thoughts on this single-sex-messaging phenomenon, so if you'd like to weigh-in please use the comments section. Please note, everybody, that we don’t assume that bis should be “into both genders equally.” We only assume that they should be into both genders at all. The swaths of red and blue that you see in these sexuality charts represent people who message only one gender. The purple areas are people who send any messages, in whatever proportion, to both men and women.

In this chart, throughout the teens and twenties, the male bisexual population is mostly observably gay men. By the mid-thirties, it seems, most of these men are more comfortable self-identifying as gay and have left the bi population. By the end of our chart, 3 of every 4 bi males on OkCupid are observably straight. Meanwhile, the proportion of men who message both women and other men holds fairly steady.

The proportions for women are more consistent over time:

12% of women under 35 on OkCupid (and the internet in general, I'd wager) self-identify as bi. However, as you can see above, only about 1 in 4 of those women is actually into both guys and girls at the same time. I know this will come as a big letdown to the straight male browsing population: three-fourths of your fantasies are, in fact, fantasies of a fantasy. Like bi men, most bi women are, for whatever reason, not observably bi. The primacy of America's most popular threesome, two dudes and an Xbox, is safe.

. . .

In gathering data for this last section on sexuality, we found so much interesting stuff that we're making it the topic of our next post. We'll look at the messaging, searching, and stalking (!) patterns of gay, bi, and straight people and see what else we can learn about the sexual continuum. Until then, no lie: thanks for reading.

842 Responses to “The Big Lies People Tell In Online Dating”

  1. Nina Pratt says:

    I’m a queer woman, interested in dating only queer women, and way older than most of your members: 62.

    Of my friends who are also on OKC, women I know pretty well, I note that lying about age, weight, income, outness, and through photos is rife.

    An excuse for us oldsters who post pics: some of us don’t own digital cameras, and depend on young relatives to take snaps of us when we visit, sometimes as rarely as once every few years. No wonder so many of us have ancient photos! I certainly do. I think only one is a year old. The rest have grown long and hoary beards.

  2. MalevolentDragon says:

    I’m a self-proclaimed bi male, who has (so far) only messaged women. I have received a few messages from other men, and not responded for a variety of reasons:

    First, I’m far more into women than men. I still identify myself as “bi” because I have no problems having sex with men. I just prefer women.

    Second, I’m EXTREMELY picky when it comes to men I find attractive. I like guys who are not flamboyant or effeminate, nor are they jockular extremes of testosterone. Basically guys just like me. I have found very, very few men on this site who seem to fit this category for me.

    Third, I would date or sleep with men, but never have a long-term committed romantic relationship with one, as I now have with my girlfriend. And I have been in a couple of OkCupid sponsored relationships where outside dating was not allowed, which means any men who sent me a message during that time got little effort on my part. :p

    Fourth (and final), my GF and I are looking for men who would join both of us in the bedroom, which means I am not sending messages to gay men whom I think will have no interest in her. Again, this limits my acceptance criteria tremendously, and there are not a lot of options in the conservative state I live in.

    So, I challenge that I’m just using the label to “appear more sexually adventurous to my (straight) matches”. On the contrary, I would argue that it might be true for women, but is the opposite for men. I think it’s quite likely women are LESS inclined to respond to my messages BECAUSE they think I’m some wild, sex-crazed guy. But it could also be because I’m already in a committed relationship. :p

    And while a slider of some sort to indicate “how bi you are” might be a better way preventing misunderstandings about labels, anyone who pokes through my Tests will notice I have taken several that do just that. They all label me as “mostly straight, slightly bi” which is how I label myself. Should I list myself as “Bisexual” on OkC? Depends on opinion.

  3. rebelwclue says:

    Very interesting but obvious. Women do prefer men 6′ tall regardless of whether the woman herself is short or tall. There are also stigmas against men that are too short and women that are too tall just as there are stigmas against women that are too fat or too old. Society rewards stereotypes. A recent article showed employers hire attractive people more often and other research shows taller men having higher paying salaries. So is it really that shocking people lie about their height, salary, or appearance online? What would be shocking is the most successful OK Cupid daters were fat, short, and had no job.

  4. q says:

    I agree with divamoma in that bi women do encounter some resistance with the lesbian sector. I have dated straight men, bi women, and lesbians. The women that I contact on ock are more likely to get back to me if they are also bi. Even if its to say thanks but no. Men who message bi women just because they are bi don’t get it, and usually don’t go anywhere.

  5. Rick says:

    Wow, talk about the men not telling the truth about height, what is the demographics show on woman not telling the truth about their age?

    Woman in general have always been given slack on their age, but come on when you say you are 43 and your pictures convey that you LOOK 53, someone isn’t telling the truth.

    I ran into a problem because of being single for several years I had NO current photographs. We somehow forget to take / use the camera when we go somewhere. Finally figured out how to get a couple and posted them.

    Tell the truth —— it’s gonna come out eventually anyways

  6. Simon LeClerk says:

    I am one of those guys who identifies as “bi” on OKC, even though I’m pretty much not. But it’s not because I’m gay. On the contrary, I’ve never even fooled around with a guy, much less had sex or a relationship with one. I identify this way because:
    1). Even though I have never actually been interested in a particular actual man, homosexual activities occasionally play a role in my fantasy life (mostly in multiple-partner scenarios) so who’s to say?
    2). My sexual preferences are out of the norm (BDSM/kinky/poly) and I identify more with the queer community than the straight community. Dan Savage talked in a recent podcast about “mostly straight guys who identify as queer” and was all for it, because the term Queer is evolving to mean someone who is out of the sexual mainstream, rather than just what gender they prefer to have sex with. Since there is no “queer” option on OKC, I choose bi.
    3). It acts as a filter. I’m starting to doubt this reason after reading this essay, but here’s the logic–I don’t want to date bigots, and if a woman is not interested in someone because he is bi, than I’m probably not interested in her. The problem with this, it seems, is that women who filter out “bi” guys on OKC probably do so because most of the “bi” guys are actually gay, and they don’t want to waste their time.

    So I will enthusiastically through my hat in the ring with those who want a Queer option, even though it could be a little confusing–those of us on the sexually atypical side of things are used to ambiguity, not to mention adventure. Along those lines, I would really like to see a way to address the issue of polyamory on OKC as well. It’s not even necessary to find a place to put “poly” or “non-monogamous”–just allow users to search for folks who list as “available” instead of only single or in a relationship.

    p.s. regarding the comments by “bi the way”–what’s wrong with sluts? I love sluts.

  7. medicinewheel says:

    I’m surprised no one brought up the obvious question – how about OKCupid’s code geeks write up a EXIF Metatag date and time check/display? That way the actual date of the photo can be promptly displayed underneath after uploading. This wouldn’t reveal any of the GPS coordinates. And they obviously already have this ability if they were able to produce these stats. Finally, if no EXIF date exists due to intentional or unintentional means, that would naturally be a large warning (no pun intended).

    Of course, someone could falsify the date by changing it in the manner I describe below. The date and time stamp is not binary or encrypted. It’s just text.

    I would check the photos myself for such dates but OKCupid rewrites the image data using gd-jpeg v1.0 when the photo is uploaded and resized. You can do this yourself if you simply open up the photo in a text editor and look for a date and time stamp in the format:

    2010:06:18 10:12:30

    Try this on an original digital photo you took yourself.

    Personally, I date my photos in the captions. I’ve met two women on OKCupid that looked *nothing* like they did in their photos. I can honestly say that absolutely kills first impressions.

  8. Hannah says:

    I’m one of those girls who lists as bi but only messages girls. In my case it’s because I started this account for the purpose of finding a girl to have fun with, along with my boyfriend. If I were single and didn’t have such a specific purpose I’d message both sexes. From my experience many MANY bi girls on the site already have a “real-life” male significant other and are branching out.

  9. Derek says:

    I feel like there’s a lot of data missing here… Where are you getting this “true” information from? The only evidence given that people lie about their height comes from comparing charts of OkC users and the average public, which seems like an fallacy. Wouldn’t an equally plausible explanation be that taller people use OkCupid?

    And since it’s already been said better, I’ll just add my agreement that it makes a big difference if a bi-sexual person is in a relationship or not when looking at who they’re primarily messaging.

  10. scQue says:

    Thx, guys! (Not.) My profile is pretty current, my photos are within the year, I admit that my income is way lower than average and I message people I find interesting (probably less than I should–but, hey, I’m antisocial)… Now everyone’s gonna be questioning my validity. I mean, it doesn’t matter: I know who I am. But still….

  11. aaron says:

    I really enjoy reading this blog.

  12. cait says:

    I’m bi, with a bi partner in an open relationship. We have both messaged users of both sexes, but by far most of our conversations are with people of the opposite sex. The pool of bi/queer people in our city is pretty small, and the pool of people cool with open relationships within that is even smaller. I would think that we end up messaging straight identified folks (people of the opposite sex) more frequently simply because there are way more of them.

    And I would *love, love, love* for “available” or “open relationship” to be an option in the relationship status section. There’s currently no precise way to filter between unavailable and available married/coupled people in the search and it would be nice if that was added. Adding that kind of functionality could really help people in open relationships connect while avoiding the mire of trying to define polyamoury. :)

  13. Raggedy Android says:

    There are over 400 comments, so this may have already been asked (I didn’t look at them all)…

    Is there any data on people who undersell themselves or advertise their flaws as a way to weed people out?

  14. Desertphile says:

    Looks like I will have to go back and edit my profile and fill it with lies, if I want more “unsolicited messages” (that doesn’t make any sense: this is a on-line dating site, therefore all messages are solicited). I am five feet eleven inches: if I want more messages, I should say I am six feet tall….. and then what happens when I meet someone in person?! And then lie about my income? And upload old images…. sheeeish (the images I uploaded have the year (2009) noted in the captions). So, okay…. I’ll go and lie like everyone else, sort of like an on-line dating arms race……

  15. Nancy says:

    OK, I know YOU don’t care about exactly how much difference a woman’s income makes when it comes to responses, but I would sure like to know. Why don’t you post a chart for responses to women by income?

    Why don’t you have a woman write one of these articles sometimes, instead of allowing everything to be filtered through a male sensibility only? What a concept huh?

  16. j says:

    I think one reason for the inconsistency in the data regarding “bisexual” users is that okcupid only allows users to identify as gay, bisexual, or straight, whereas in reality, there are a multitude of other ways one may identify when it comes to sexual orientation. I’m an okcupid user who identifies only as queer- I’m interested in a variety of individuals, regardless of their sex and gender. However, I am put into the category of “bisexual” by okcupid. This may not seem problematic as far as functionality goes on a dating site, until one takes into account the fluidity of sexuality. Just because someone is attracted to different genders overall does not mean that at certain points in their life, they are not overwhelmingly interested in one in particular. Personally, though I am sexually attracted to all sorts of people, I am mostly interested in dating women at this point in my life. Thus, even though okcupid lists me as bisexual, I rarely, if ever, contact men through the website. Also, let’s be honest, it’s easy as hell to meet men in real life. Meeting women is much more difficult, which is what leads one to use online dating sites in the first place.

  17. Ayisha says:

    I’m 5′ 6 and 5/8”. Roughly. It seems to bobble somewhere between 3/8 and 3/4, depending on when I get measured. But I list myself as 5′ 6”. Perhaps I should say 5′ 7”? But that seems more like lying, because I’m definitely not 5′ 7”, as my taller sisters will tell you. See, I’ve gotten used to saying 5’6”. If you say you’re 5’7”, some girl will say, “Oh, really? I’m 5’7”,” and peer down at you. (Men, what sounds more truthful to you?)

    I wish men nearing 6’0” would just say they are 5’10” or 5’11”. I may not be everywoman, but I feel a little intimidated by the big 6-0 on a guy’s profile. I’d much rather have a guy I can look up in the eye, or have to tip up my head for, slightly, than a guy where my chin goes back and I have trouble swallowing. My last boyfriend was always groaning about how he wasn’t tall enough, and I gave up trying to explain that he was more sexy at 5’10” than he’d be at 6’2”, because I could actually see him from close up. But the height thing isn’t a dealbreaker. If a guy’s 6’4”, I’d still find out what he was like first, and if he was 5’8” that wouldn’t be a problem. But yes, I’ve got to admit it, I do have to push the height thing out of my mind with some force if the guy is 5’6” or shorter. Especially when I take into account that some men are, either from deception or hopefulness, inflating their inches.

    I’m curious how you controlled for unanswered fields. For instance, many men don’t give a salary at all, or say “prefer not to say”. Some of them probably do it because their income isn’t impressive, but several men seem to do it b/c they have a good income, judging by their job description. I wonder if the demographic of people declining to answer q’s is the same on OKC as in real life?

  18. mifairlady says:

    you really need to look at your sliders hard cupid they are dumb.. and monotonouusdoesnt matter what anyone tells you in their write up ask the questions and perhaps if done right yo can zoom in on who and what they almost reallly ae and if you would be really interested in pursueing and what can yo ulose anyway a cup of coffee time at first meeting? so make a friend of them if nothing else.. diane see what I mean you cant even get this downloaded correctly!!! shame on cupid im going to match.com

  19. Chuck H. says:

    One thing you may want to mention about the income over reporting is that in order to get on OKcupid.com you have to access the internet. This leads to a selection bias in that you have to be able to afford a computer and the internet. Thus, naturally OKcupid.com members will make more money on average than the national numbers. It isn’t over reporting, it is selection.

  20. Blu says:

    Your analysis of how bisexuals message may not be correct. Although they may overwhelmingly message people of one sex it may be because one particular gender is more interested in them. For example I am bisexual but mainly message men because generally they respond better to direct messaging. Assuming that people who put ‘bisexual’ as a sexual-orientation do so only to look more adventurous is actually offensive and quite ignorant.

  21. Marco Lanza says:

    Seeing this, now I am happy because I am not lying about my height (and it’s funny but people think I am taller than I am thinking), age, and my profile picture is recent (Christmas, if that’s recent). I cannot take pictures all the time and keeping updating…

    For the women here that have being “hoaxed”, it sounds on real life that women always goes for the “bad and the liar” instead of be real and not dreaming. Please, don’t think that I am mad as it sounds in this comment. I am older, and experience in life counts. Sometimes I think as an advice: “wait a minute, this sound to good to be true”.

    Perhaps, it’s the saying that “money talks bs walks. (sorry for the word, that’s no me, very rarely I say bad words but that’s the saying.

    Thanks for the article; it’s a very good one!!!

    Sorry if my words does not make sense, I am not native and speak more than one language or better say languages.

    Hope that you all find what you’re looking for.

    Kisses and huges for everyone.

    Gordinha24.

    P.S.: If you guys decide to post this, don’t worry about my real OKCUPID name as Gordinha24 being here – I have no problem with that – like I said, I am sincere and real, no fake.

  22. Lynette says:

    Thank you, OKCupid!! I laughed through this whole article…..even the responses…..Thanx

  23. Noraye says:

    All my photos are all within anywhere from 3 – 10 months, I don’t lie about my age or my height (5 foot 2). I happen to look younger than I am (34) and do the same things as a lot of my 20-something friends do: play drinking games at parties, etc.

    I tend to attract younger guys around 25, and my best friend is 10 years younger than me.

    It’s about how ya feel, eh. :)

  24. Alix Diaz says:

    Very good study/data interpretation. I really appreciate it. In my case, my pics were 2 yrs. old bec. these were the ones in my lap top and it was more convenient to just upload outright and accomplish asap what your site was requiring. Everything I said in my data are all true including my name. As I “surfed” in this site, I noticed most are using “aliases”/pseudonyms and there were times I wished I also used one. Re: telling lies. Those who are , are just giving problems to themselves. What if you decide to meet the fellow? Another web of lies? What a pressure! What a life?

  25. 1-2-maybeu says:

    I feel that if a person feels they need to lie about themselves on a profile, then when will the lieing ever stop? I can sort of understand why they do it on profiles, but I guess it boils down to an insecure feeling about who they really are. I ,for one, can not stand being lied to and I will not tolerate it in my personal life. My biggest downfalls (I feel) is that I tell it like it is while not wanting to hurt anyone. I would rather not be led to believe a lie and not get hurt, than to know the full truth and get hurt. I dont like to be hurt either but I will soon enough be able to deal with and move forward knowing the truth has been said. A lie usually always means another lie is told to cover loose ends of the first lie, then another is told for the same reasons of the second lie, and so on until so many lies have been told that the person telling them ends up getting mad at you because they cant remember all the lies they have told to try to hide ONE thing. That being the TRUTH.

  26. Penny says:

    Bi friends tell me it’s easier to get one gender or the other, so maybe they sign up to OKCupid to look for the one they have more difficulty with offline?

  27. Mags says:

    I recently went out on a date with somebody who had listed their height at about 5’8″. He was already sitting when we met up, and it wasn’t until the end of the date that we got up to walk through town. I was already on the fence with this guy, leaning towards not being into him. As we were walking it hit me that I was taller than him. I’m pretty short at 5’3″ (and 3/4 but that’s not an option to put on okc), so my platforms only made me a little taller. He probably assumed I would wear flatland the height difference would be enough that I wouldn’t notice. The whole situation was enough to push me in the direction of uninterested, rather than trying for a second date. It wasn’t the height itself that botherred me, I’ve liked short guys before, it was the lie.

  28. dirtylyingliars says:

    So as a 29 year old guy who makes under $30K, lists myself shorter than my actual height, and never sends the first message…I’m not doing it right?

    Well that’s obvious.

  29. ria says:

    OMG! This article is so true. I have experienced that men lie about their height!! That really pisses me off! As if I won’t notice when I meet you. Now instead of rejecting you quickly online, I have to reject you in person. Guys–STOP lying about your height!!!

  30. Me says:

    Well, I guess it all just comes down to plain old honesty. The picture thing I can see one can’t get past – I mean, if someone with male pattern baldness uses a picture from high school or college, well that’s pretty easy to nail down. Same goes for the lady who posts a pictures from her younger days but hasn’t fit into those jeans for years. It just makes sense to post a real, updated picture or you’ll wind up having a lot of five minute “dates”.

    As for the other, non visual, stuff; that’s tougher since we don’t have to provide a birth certificate, college transcript, etc. to post a profile here.

  31. brons2 says:

    I really am the exact height I say I am in my profile, 6’7″. Maybe I should say that I am two inches shorter. According to the chart it says 6’5″ guys get the most sex, but then the amount falls off sharply after that.

    I also make the exact income that I report, and my main profile photo is about 30 days old.

    Maybe I should lie, it seems that it’s working better for other guys, despite what women may say.

  32. AriannaAine says:

    I think a part of the discrepancy between claimed bisexuality and observed bisexuality mostly comes from romantic interest. For instance, I am bisexual myself, and have had sex with males and females, but am romantically heterosexual (with one or two major exceptions). While I am attracted to both, I prefer a relationship with a man over a woman.

    Of course there will also be people who lie for whatever reason. I’ve known women who say they are when they aren’t, thinking it’s attractive to men, and men who’ve said they aren’t when the are, thinking it’s UNattractive to women.

    It’s a sticky topic, really.

  33. pixie1710 says:

    What about asking about weight? I am no size 10 or 12 or 14 but 18-20. Alot of guys out there will say they want that slender, skinnier girl. But some will say with a ‘few extra pounds’ that they are open minded and blah blah blah, but in reality they are wanting that size 10 or 12 and I have asked to chat to some who say they are open to this. I have gotten some guys who will outright say no, I don’t want a ‘fat’ chic, or they weren’t really wanting a large girl but were willing to be ‘friends’ with one. And the worst ones are the ones who think because you are big you are desperate. It would be good to have an option to choose maybe different sized people, ie. slender, athletic, average, a few extra pounds etc. This would then stop me from wasting my time on the ‘barbie doll’ hunters and look at what people are really after. I know there shouldn’t be a problem but hey we are in the real world, and that first visual impression, though may be shallow, does mean alot to many.

  34. SerenaSkate says:

    From one woman to your survey, after almost two years of being on internet dating sites and meeting a few men, I personally have found men who were really 6’0″ tall or taller generally told the truth about their height online. If they were really shorter than 6’0,” I found the guys I actually met at least 90% of the time were 2″ or more shorter than what they posted.

    Also, I asked my male friends is there was a way I could ask a man, before I met him, what his real height was, and I was told “no.” So, I am left with being disappointed to meet men that are not at the eye level they attest they are. What is a tall girl to do?

    So, for the most part, I agree with your summary of men’s heights. If they say 5’10,” generally they are 5’8.” If they say 6’0,” generally, they are really 5’10.”

  35. Steve says:

    For the most part the lies I run into from women is the pic they post are10 to 15 years old and the body type. But I have to share the ultimate in fraud that happened in 2004, three years after my wife died.
    I tried to get back on the dating scene so I joined a site sponsored by AOL Personals.
    I found myself talking to a black women via email. The pic that was posted was very attractive. We talked on the phone for a couple of weeks then we scheduled to meet.
    I went to meet this person at a restaurant in Westchester, CA. When I walked in I was looking around, this short woman came up to me and asked me if was Steve (I still am Steve) I said yes and I was looking for woman named Angela. She said I am Angela.
    I was flabbergasted. This woman was so far removed from what was posted on the dating site. I asked why did you lie? She went into a story about her lack of confidence because of her weight and looks … she used a co-workers picture, who was married!!! I said feel sorry for you, good luck and left.

  36. Davewe says:

    I consider myself to be an honest, ethical person yet lie in my profile. The fact is that certain personal facts are more easily overlooked in “real” life vs. an online profile. In the real world I rarely take a tape measure or scale around with me and have had numerous relationships with women who were a bit taller than I am. But when you see such facts in cold black and white it puts people off.

    Imagine meeting someone for the first time. Would you ask them what their height and height and income was? Most people would consider that to be rude. But online a complete stranger thinks they have a right to know. I disagree.

    Btw, I notice that while all online dating sites ask about height, none of them ask about weight. They recognize that far less people would sign up if they had to list their true weight rather than just a nebulous listing such as body type.

  37. Z says:

    One thing to consider when you guys run the stats is that SOME people communicate with friends on the site. I would imagine to assume they’re communicating with same sex for romantic purposes it should either comprise 5% of total communication or maybe at least 5 different people of same sex.

    Also, a lot of girls are bisexual in that they either get off to girls or occasionally hookup with them, but its not their romantic preference and wouldn’t want an actual relationship with them, thus wouldn’t communicate with them on the site as much.

  38. NotTellingYou says:

    The site needs a more ambiguous “attracted to” type of flag instead of “straight, bi, gay”

    There are people who are attracted to certain subsets, but not the entire gender as a whole.

    Like, I’d rather self-label bi but date someone else that is a lesbian-who-kinda-bi than date a girl who is straight-and-kinda-bi.

    If only I could write out a truth table in this…

    You are attracted to: Men [x] Women[x] Somewhere in between [x]
    ..You would most likely respond to: Men ( ) Women (O) Somewhere in between ( )
    …who consider themselves: Straight [x] Gay/Lesbian[x] Bi [x] Somewhere in between[x] Would not consider at all ( )
    (repeat for each ticked box)

    I’m also entirely disappointed with that height table. You’ve effectively made it clear that the ideal height is 5’10 for both sexes. Poor short guys and tall ladies.

    What about matching keywords with a quiz?
    “What did you think of Twlight (Movie)?” Loved it (O) Hated it (), Neutral ( ), Haven’t seen it ( ), How important is your matches answer? (not, somewhat, very, required, etc)

  39. betty says:

    I am 5’9 and I also think it’s very interesting that men lie about how tall they are. I have met a couple men on okcupid and they have been shorter than me by 2 inches. Now if i have a man message me because he is interested i tell him to check his tape measure for i am truly 5’9.
    But here is something interesting. The men I have gone out with have the same horror stories about women and how much they weigh.
    Why lie? If you meet someone you’ll know the truth. Don’t make a fool out of yourself. Be honest.

  40. Drewkulele says:

    I had to laugh out loud when I saw that your ‘Sex Partners By Height – Males’ chart peaked at 6’5″, because I’m 6’5″ (really) and, trust me, I ain’t gettin’ any these days, OK?

  41. LV says:

    I have to echo what another commenter mentioned. I’ve met with a few women for dates and been told I’m a lot taller than they expected. I’m 6’2, and I clearly list myself as such. Maybe their perception of what 6’2 should be is off. To stay consistent, maybe I should list myself as 6’4…

  42. Mike S. says:

    I thought this was really interesting, and yes, it is impossible for the data to be 100% accurate because there are always factors that will affect the margin of error in any look at statistics, that’s just the nature of the beast. If you feel like you’re misrepresented by what was said here, look at it this way, that means your special because your the exception to the rule, which is a good thing, so don’t get mad at what the numbers say. It’s just food for thought, not something to get worked up over. I do have a few thoughts on some of the previous comments that I read on this article.

    There was one comment that essentially stated that if a girl would automatically rule out sex with a guy who was bisexual, that made her a biggot. I don’t think that’s fair at all to say. There is a big difference between harboring hatred towards someone because of their sexuality and preferring not have a sexual relationship with someone because of their sexuality. You’re essentially saying that it’s not okay for a woman to not feel comfortable about the idea of her male partner having or having had sex with another man. If that’s something she feels comfortable with, it’s not fair to expect her to override that feeling and pretend she doesn’t care. If you’re not comfortable with something your partner has done or is doing, you can try to lie to yourself all you want, but the relationship is going to fail. Telling someone they should deny how they feel to the deepest core of their being just to make someone else happy is one of the biggest examples of the biggotry your preaching against. FYI, to whoever authored the post I’m referring to, you’re still cool in my book, but I just thought I’d offer a different point of view on the matter.

    In regards to people lying on their profile, I don’t think you can explain that rationally, because it’s not a rational move, but rather a move based on a rationalization. I think the thought process of the “profile liar” goes a little something like this, I’ll use in this example a guy who is shorter than average: “Well, I can put on here that I’m 5’8″, because that’s the truth, but a lot of women are going to see that and pass me over just because they see that number as not meeting their ideal height requirement, but if I say I’m 5’10”, I might luck out and when we meet she either won’t notice, or I can win her over with my personality so maybe the fact that I’m shorter than she would like won’t matter.”

    Although the truth is, as many of you have said, that for the most part, the person is going to feel lied to and any chance at intimacy is going to shut down immediately anyway, I think this is an interesting commentairy from the perspective of the person telling the lie as well as the greater motivating force behind why these lies are usually told.

    Unfortunately, it’s kind of an unfixable problem, because the problem is that most people tend to think too heavily on their preferences in a match when looking at profiles. The key word here is “preferences”. It’s one thing if you absolutely know without a doubt in your mind that you could never be attracted to someone who is under a certain height, is overweight, has the wrong color of eyes, or whatever, that’s one thing, but I think a lot of people pass over a profile just as easy because the person doesn’t meet a “preference” as they would if the person didn’t meet one of their absolute requirements. It’s so easy to do because the next profile is just a click away and that next person could be EXACTLY what you’re looking for. The problem with that idea is that you may have just passed over a person that you would have connected with in a truly profound way, so deeply that you could have easily overlooked the fact that they didn’t meet one of your preferences, only to find someone who, while physically being everything you’re looking for, and looking good on paper doesn’t stack up in the personality, maturity or honesty department. I’m just as guilty as anyone else of doing this, except I tend to do it more over taste of movies and music, or because a girl owns cats lol. I personally lean more towards the “their going to find out anyway” school of thought, but with the idea of people treating preferences like requirements on dating sites, it’s easy to see how people feel like they’ll never meet anyone if they’re truly honest about their flaws. Just some thoughts and ideas. A lot of people who commented on this thing had some really good insight and it was cool to read, so I thought I’d add a bit of my own, even if it turned out to be a little long-winded.

  43. James says:

    @medicinewheel: “if no EXIF date exists due to intentional or unintentional means, that would naturally be a large warning”

    Why? As I said earlier, I never bother to set the date/time on my cameras – and don’t really understand why most people would – so it’s always going to show up as some short time after whatever the maker has made the default.

    @Rick: “…when you say you are 43 and your pictures convey that you LOOK 53, someone isn’t telling the truth.”

    Again why? How about someone who says they’re 53, but look 43? I know lots of people who look much older or younger than their stated age, starting with my neighbor, who doesn’t look a day over 75, even though he’s 96, or maybe 97 now.

  44. Ari says:

    Just putting my voice out there as a bi gal who is only looking for women on okC, even though I date both sexes.

    It’s all about what you’re looking for right now, and I know I’m not alone when I say that men and women fill very different roles in my life even though I am attracted to/have relationships with both.

  45. Shane says:

    Most of this has been said before, but here’s my two cents.

    Bisexuality is a difficult topic to grasp, define, and analyse. Most (and especially bisexuals) would call sexuality fluid. There isn’t just black, white and grey, grey has a ton of different shades, and people move along that grey ‘slider’ throughout their lives.

    In addition, some gays identify as bisexual to avoid stigmas or to ease into being identified as fully homosexual. Some straights identify as bisexual cause they think it’s cool, and that leaves ‘true’ bisexuals with a broken reputation and statistics about bisexuality an analyst’s nightmare.

    Also, the expectations and social dangers that exist in public do not exist in the same ways online, so if I have no problem meeting and talking to women in real life, I might choose in my online dating life to seek out men, which is in part what you see trending in your data.

    Lastly I’m 5’11”, pictures mix recent and back a couple years, and poor people have more character.

  46. wishing_ says:

    hmm. I’ve never lied about anything! Wow, the idea that people lie is foreign to me! Who knew??! And, then, I am listed as bisexual, I message both females and males,. I message anyone by reading journal posts, profiles, and photos, I never consider the age or height or INCOME! Wow, I guess I am supposed to be concerned about that stuff? I may seem to message women more often, but it is only because I can meet men in real life, pretty easily. They are always right aroound the corner, .. but unless a chick is carrying rainbows and triangles? I have no idea who is Bi or lesbian? Am I that clueless? I am much more likely to meet a woman in real life, than a man from OKC. too scary…

  47. kate says:

    I object to considering a slightly out of date picture as a lie. If you’ve put on fifty pounds – perhaps. But if you still look pretty much the same, it could be perfectly fine.

    My own pictures: 0.5, 1 and 1.5 years old — all of these I consider absolutely current. The fourth picture is from 5-6 years ago, but I don’t see anything wrong with that either. It shows me in an environment that I would expect my dates to appreciate (camping), and it just happens to be a good picture. Besides, I didn’t look that different at 22.

    A current photo won’t necessarily show how you really are in real life. A good photo would show character, expression, etc. Taking a good picture takes either skill or luck, and that doesn’t happen every few months.

  48. Aru says:

    I’m a bi guy, and I lean much more towards women than me. I found that to successfully message a lot of women I kind of have to stay in the closet, because with a lot of women it’s a barrier to entry. No use being contentious if I’m not gonna get what I want. (That’s a dilemma too…loads of straight female users vs.a comparitive few gay/bi male users in my area, so I kind of have to pick and choose one group of prospects vs. another group.) There are probably a lot of bi people out there identifying on site as straight or gay/lesbian to get around what’s almost a kind of stigma around being bi with some of the people on the site that aren’t counted in these statistics.

  49. tiffany says:

    i loved all of this information! so much fun to see the stats vs the facts…. i didn’t read too many of the comments (some of them were not nearly as interesting as the blog itself!) but i wanted to addmy personal perspective on the bisexual status… i’m married to a guy, slightly openly, in the sense that we occasionally have a playmate. i identify as bi instead of gay for two reasons… one, obviously, its more correct and honest, and two, i’d like to meet women who are interested him too, and generally gay women just aren’t. i’ve chatted with many women who do the opposite though, proclaim gay when really they are bi, to reduce the lame hits from guys who have no class… to no avail though, because people with no class just have no class so you really can’t deter them!! lol… anyway, it was fun info! thanks for all the hard work!

  50. Henry Montague says:

    So our society is so consumeristic that we effectively have to buy the right to attempt to reproduce? Does anybody else see a problem with this? The richest people are not necessarily the best adapted. If anything, in most cases, they’re the best at screwing over other people. Also, rich people tend to be the least adaptable, as shown by their propensity to vote Conservative. Women who date men based on a high income perpetuate sexism by ensuring that the status quo remains in place: men work and must take care of their inferior women, women stay at home with the kids, but they can work if they REALLY want. Since there is always a risk of tone being misinterpreted in text, I would make clear that the status quo is in no way something I endorse. I hope that some women who have been selecting portfolios instead of men will read this and wake up. A society wherein exists equal rights for men and women will never exist so long as women insist on being taken care of/bought.