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. Ryan says:

    I too would be interested to see the income graph be inclusive of those that don’t report their income.

    @lee1026 I’m thinking females have a pretty good BS detector, most 20/21 year olds are most definitely not making $70/80K as you wouldn’t even be out of college yet. So they guess they are lying.
    Also I’ve never hired (or know anyone that has) on a 20/21yo for entry level work in my tech companies, so your estimate of that being a starting wage is a bit off…even for the Silicon Valley where I worked.

  2. Eion says:

    Always love the OkTrends blog, however I noticed a problem in this post. You’re comparing the entire OkCupid site (potentially international) against the US population’s height, rather than only using the US members of OkCupid to compare with. Can you change the graphs to compare US users of OkCupid’s height with US heights instead?

  3. Subtle says:

    I’m bisexual. I message no one. I get messaged primarily by men–I think this is because, in general, women don’t send out messages. Even to other women, especially to bisexual women.

    For the most part, I respond to everyone’s message, at least once.

  4. enGINeerNtonic says:

    I find it hard to believe that there’s be any bias in the set of “people who use online dating” toward being tall. I don’t believe that anyone who interacts with human beings on a regular basis could honestly be surprised to find out that most people exaggerate their height, weight, and anything else that can’t be readily measured on the spot in conversation. They lie just as often about that in real life.

    The one I would believe involves more sample bias in the set of people on OKCupid and less lying is income. People with higher incomes in the US are more likely to get married and start families at later ages. They’re also more likely to have broadband internet connections. Not to mention the fact that people who make less money are more likely to skip that question and we’ve all seen a few profiles where someone who admitted they were unemployed put their income at a million dollars for giggles.

  5. Diacritic says:

    The income thing does convince me that my decision not to list mine was right. You’re either a pauper or a liar. I’m tempted to remove my height now, too.

  6. Jeff says:

    This has been brought up, but I wanted to reiterate what I almost(!) found in this post: as a 26 year old man who makes more than average but not an extraordinary amount ($80k), should I put it in my profile? I’ve left the income part blank because, well, it just seems a little forward. Is my prudishness causing me to lose hits, or is the extra attention not worth it?

  7. Duchamp says:

    I’ve never really been to space camp.

  8. M says:

    I’m 5’9″, bisexual, and not offended at all by these results. Keep up the good work.

  9. naranja says:

    The bisexuals only messaging one gender thing is most likely influenced by the fact that bi’s might only be using OK Cupid for one gender, but this does not mean they are actually not bi in real life. They might be in a relationship with one gender and looking for hookups (or a 3-some partner) online. Or they might be interested in a relationship with one gender, but think it’s only fair to let potential dating partners know their sexual tastes extend to the other gender too (I imagine there is, for instance, a fraction of the female population a guy who wants to date a woman but has slept or wants to sleep with other men might want to rule out from the start because those women wouldn’t be comfortable with that revelation over dinner). Also, many people go through long term sexual phases. They might only be into one gender now, but if they’ve had relationships with the other gender in the past they might identify as bi when asked in such limited terms to define their orientation. Anyway, the point is that “aha! bisexuality is a myth!” seems to me to be the least likely conclusion you could have jumped to here….

  10. Matthew says:

    I take these statistics with a grain of salt.

    Many people list themselves as making over a million dollars as a joke. I know at one point I did.

    To be honest, I couldn’t care less about men lying about their height. That probably isn’t much of a factor in the first date. Now, lying about their penis size… haha… that’s something else entirely.

  11. fakenw says:

    I always wondered about the bisexual thing, especially living in the midwest where you wouldn’t expect every other female to be bi. Honestly thought it was some sort of default option that girls were forgetting to uncheck.

  12. Mr. Me says:

    It only proves many truths about online dating. Such as some women are golddiggers looking for men with high incomes, conversely, some men use income to entice women. Both fail. Shorter men are more abundant then taller men, so get over it. Odds are taller women will go out with you unless they wish to date hardly anyone. Bonus: their legs are long. And finally, that online dating skews how things play out in real life. In real life, we don’t know inches and ages and income, we just get to meet a person and the chemistry is there or not and can override those factors rather than make preliminary judgments based on age/income/height numbers, which is why in real life, people actually haver more success finding mates than online, as real life trumps online life, thank you very much.

  13. Ken Aston says:

    As mentioned by ChickenFriedStk, I don’t think it can be assumed that the height and income distribution of the general population is the same as on OKCupid. It should be considered that tall people and those with higher income are more likely to use online dating.

  14. Michael Bishop says:

    Are you really assuming that the height and even the income distribution of okcupid users is the same as the entire U.S.?

  15. RL says:

    I know a lot of bisexual women who only use okcupid to date women, despite their real life dating habits, and bisexual men who only use it for men. For some people it’s easier to be out online, and therefore will be more likely to use a site like this more for same-sex attraction. Also, there are polyamorous people aplenty on OKC (who don’t get to label themselves as such), some of whom are with one gender and therefore are now looking for a partner of the other gender.

    I’m a bisexual man, and I’ve gone through various long term phases of only messaging one gender. I think OKCupid habits aren’t a reflection of real life, but are more like compensation for real life. I find a lot more success in real life of finding women who are interested in me, so I’m more likely to use OKCupid to find men as a result. I think it’s important to take that into consideration: we don’t all use OKC to do the same things we do in real life.

  16. Nick says:

    I was surprised to see that the entire hight distribution was shifted to the right. I’m not surprised that those below average or below six feet inflate but I’m a little shocked that evidence that the obfuscation is across the board. In my case I stand an honest 6’4″ barefoot, he’ll I could claim 6’4.25″ if I wanted to get nit picky, now why on earth would I claim 6’6″ I hit my head on enough things allready.
    I wonder if the height and wage inflation isn’t as bad as it seems I would assume that the average okc user is better educated and more technologically savvy than the population at large. This could definately explain some of the income inflation and maybe some of height duplicity.

    Oh, and I’m waiting with baited breath to see if team okc does a break-down of fibbers by region, race, Religion, politics, sexual orientation, and employment field.

  17. Helbinor says:

    Quick comment regarding height: don’t OKC users skew to the younger side of the population? My understanding is that the younger generation is taller due to better nutrition and not having their bones / spinal disks compressed. So if OKC users are disproportionately young, it stands to reason that they would be disproportionately tall as well.

    The data for women seems to corroborate this: women do not have the same incentive to lie about height that men do, so you would think the shift would not be as pronounced.

  18. snorkel_lover says:

    As a single, bi female, I have found I get messaged by way more men than women. I’ve had to revise my profile many times until I finally was clear enough that I am looking for a relationship, not a fling with one or more people.

    I have messaged and actually met both men and women from OKC, though there aren’t as many single women interested in women as single men seeking women. I wish there were more lesbians and bi chicks here!

    One thing I would like to see analyzed- what are the differences between people who prefer IM versus email? From my experience, I see a bit difference, but I wonder if that holds true for a broader sampling?

  19. matt says:

    To people who object that this post assumed that bi people were into both genders equally: I suggest you re-read the post. The analysis looked at bi-identifying men and women who messaged both genders (even if they messaged only one gender once) vs bi-identifying men and women who messaged a gender EXCLUSIVELY. This was not analysis of who you generally message, but whether you only message one gender or the other.

  20. epenthesis says:

    I’d be more interested in response patterns than initial message patterns in re. bisexuality. Assuming men tend to initiate contact more often (I think the data bear that out), maybe there are a lot of bi people of both sexes who send messages principally to women, with the expectation that men will be contacting them anyway.

    Or maybe not, but it would be nice to have some data to confirm it either way.

  21. Ellyn says:

    I don’t find the information about bisexuals unusual at all. Just because you identify as bisexual doesn’t mean you are dating men and women at the same time all the time. Why do people constantly challenge bi people’s ability to self-identify as bi? There seems to be this need to prove that we don’t exist. We exist. Let it be.

  22. miller says:

    As others have said, bisexuals are not necessarily attracted to both genders equally. They might decide to focus exclusively on one gender because they know they like that gender more. They may also prefer a particular gender for other reasons, for example, if they like gay culture better than straight culture or vice versa.

    Some things I’m curious about for next time: How many messages are they sending out? If they’re sending hundreds of messages all to one gender, that would be far more surprising than if they’re sending just a few. What do we get if we perform the same analysis on gay and straight people?

  23. Alex says:

    Am I REALLY the only person out there that doesn’t even remotely take into account a persons income at all when looking for a date? really? you people are shallow.

  24. Maxine says:

    *Sigh* yeah ok, so you put a disclaimer in about the bisexuality bit, but honestly I’ve heard drivel about bisexuality being a lie all too many times to let that pass. There’s a good page about bisexuality here: http://bit.ly/b8S2np

    “We prefer to think of bisexuality as being like the English Channel, you get wet as soon as you start swimming from Dover and can’t dry off until Calais, no matter how shallow (or deep) it is beneath you!”

    Me, I’m not really here to actively date, but I mostly start conversations with women. Since there are far more straight guys around than there are women interested in women, I just don’t need a dating site to meet guys. I have all the men in my life I need, thanks very much. (On the other hand, if I was actually single and looking actively for partners in general, I might well contact mainly men, since I’m statistically nine times more likely to find a compatible male than a female – assuming about 90% of the population is hetero)

    Also I wonder if the gaps in the income and height bell curves fill out when you include the number of people who haven’t declared those details – after all a guy is more likely to display his income etc. if it’s on the high end, no?

  25. Tyson says:

    I think your analysis of self-professed Bisexuals overlooks the difference between sexual interest vs. romantic interest. People may be reporting accurately that they are sexually interested in both sexes and “would go there” to some degree, but their romantic attraction in terms of finding an actual regular-dating or longer-term relationship may be more one-sided.

    OKC being more of a dating/relationship oriented site, rather than a sex hookup site, it’s perhaps not surprising that a lot of folks who report they would be willing to have sex with both men and women may not be interested in seeking romantic relationships with both men and women. They may be open to proposed intimate encounters with members of either sex, but when it comes to their actively looking for what they ultimately, ideally really want, they’re much more specific, even exclusively so.

  26. M says:

    I agree with how some other people put it. Personally, as a bi woman, I date both men & women in person, but tend to only message women on OkC, because men message me. It’s that way in life, too. If I’m interested in a woman, I have to make the first move, but if I’m interested in a guy, I wait to be approached.

  27. spacegeologist says:

    Does the 1 in 10 rule of thumb for homosexuality hold true for the OKC population? Is there a shift in the demographic? Do sexual orientation ratios it vary by age, gender, state or income? I look forward to your next post on this subject. Are you attempting to publish this in any legitimate sociology journals?

  28. Starr says:

    I agree with what many people on here are saying on the bisexuality topic. There are so many variables under that category. Ex. Pan-sexuality, those unsure, those looking for a third, those who can only seem to meet one gender in their everyday life and not the other, those who prefer one over the other but are still open to dating the other. It all depends on exactly what the person is looking for at the given time or in general. There is so much of a gray area in sexuality that it’s hard for people to really specify. There is not just the GLBT community. For that to fit it should at least be GLBTTQQP Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Transexual, Queer, Questioning, Pansexual and I’m sure many others. Gay, lesbian and bi doesn’t cover it and often people are accused of lying if they fall into the gray area and try putting one of those options. It’s easier for me being fully lesbian but I have met many people and have many friends with this problem

  29. Yellodog says:

    This is depressing. I’m 5’8″ and say so. A lot of women claim they’re looking for someone 5’9″ or taller — Where I see that, I won’t bother to write, even if she’s 5’3″. Now that the height-shift phenomenon is pubic, will women assume that I’m really 5’6″? Sheesh.

    And how many people lie about age? Because people search on decades, posting arbitrary limits at 30, 40, 50, 60, there’s strong incentive to limit your reported age to 29, 39, 49 etc. Would be interesting to see if the occurrence of x9 ages is non-random.

  30. PK says:

    I am slightly taller in real life than my profile (1/2″) and declined to state income, but it would fall in the top category by a wide margin.

    Apparently I’m missing out on some dates (or at least messages)…

    I don’t know; I don’t mind casual but the idea that someone contacted me or responded to me just because I admitted I’m making well over $100k a year seems slightly offensive.

  31. Another Psychologist says:

    As a psychologist, I can say that, for the bisexual section, you are talking as though you have longitudinal data when you have cross-sectional data. In other words, you did NOT follow the same sample of people for 36 years, from age 18 to 54 years, starting way back 36 years ago in 1974, and see how their pattern of messaging changed. You looked at a group of 18-year-olds and a group of 20-year-olds and a group of 22-year-olds, etc, all messaging when the study was taken. You cannot talk about how bisexuals’ behavior changes over time, because you did not study that. You can only talk about what 18-year-olds and 20-year-olds and 22-year-olds are acting like today. A bisexual who is 54 today, and was born in 1956 had totally differently forces shaping his/her behavior than a bisexual who is 18 today, and was born in 1992. Your conclusions are completely erroneous.

  32. Helen's Eidolon says:

    I have no idea if this could help to explain it (and I actually have very little confidence that it could), but here goes nothing. I’m a bi woman who almost exclusively messages women on online dating sites for one simple reason: I can get a guy at a bar. It’s so much easier to meet men in real life that when I come online, I skew the other way to make up for it.

  33. Nik says:

    Interesting post; it’s especially interesting how response rates vs. age and income come into play, but the major missing piece of information is how does it compare to those who don’t list their income?

  34. Fargo says:

    Do it in metrics and you’ll get much more feedback

  35. Angela says:

    GAH! on your bisexuality analysis. So much fail. Your insinuations that we’re maybe actually straight or gay are so irritating and borderline offensive, if only because it is based on such a lack of imagination when interpreting your data. And, this crap is hardly original – it’s a charge that is continually levied against bisexuals. It’s hard not to get frustrated and tired of needing to prove that we aren’t lying about identity.

    As for your numbers:

    It is certainly sometimes the case that someone who identifies as bisexual is just masking being gay (or rarely, straight). As you note, this is more likely to occur when someone is younger. That said, I can’t imagine that this explains the bulk of what you’re seeing.

    Various things that are probably contributing to the data you’re seeing: A lot of bisexual people have a regular partner of one gender, and have license to look for (and only look for) a regular partner of the other (see: One Penis Policy). Or, even if they aren’t in open relationships that only allow exploration with members of one gender, they are only really seeking that out because they are already ‘set’ for the gender they are partnered with. It isn’t how I work, but it’s how many bi poly people seem to work. This site has legion of those folks.

    I identify as bisexual and I’ve met 3 partners from OKC – 2 men, one woman, which is roughly in proportion to how straight/gay I am in practice. That said, I’ve probably messaged with many more guys than girls; I don’t initiate contact often, and guys initiate so much more.

    The most overarching interpretation I can give is that people tend to come on OKC to try to get a certain currently-unmet need met . For a variety of reasons this need often may only be present for members of one gender, even if the person is bisexual, and that certainly doesn’t negate their bisexual identity.

    Other possible scenarios: Maybe they are single and usually partner with members of one gender, and only hook up with the other gender – a bi guy dates women on OKC, and meets guys in gay bars (this reflects my bi male partner to some degree). Or their contact with one gender is generally incidental/situational – a woman dates men, but plays with women at kink parties or in group situations. Or the aforementioned situation where the person is poly, partnered, and only looking for the gender opposite their current partner.

    It is often the case that a bisexual person will have sex with both genders but in practice will only *date* members of one gender. This could be because they just grew up and were socialized/taught how to date straight, so it comes more naturally, or on the flip side (much more common than you would might think, even among gay identified men) they are a part of the gay or lesbian community and don’t want to leave, but are actually attracted to both genders.

    It’s ridiculous and offensive for you to try to negate peoples’ stated identities based on this one poorly-interpreted data point. Lying about bisexuality exists; this data is way too flimsy to be any indication of the prevalence of that. I don’t generally get so worked up about ‘bisexual issues’ but the fact is that we have to deal *all the time* with people telling us we’re lying about our identities. After a while it gets really fucking old.

    I’m also a statistician. Good statisticians go beyond data points and think about underlying biases/dynamics, before drawing sweeping conclusions.

    /end rant

  36. Keith says:

    OKC is a dating site; people expect the information on it to be useful in, well, dating. Listing yourself as “bisexual” as a “state of mind” or an “outlook on life”, when it doesn’t have anything to do with who you are willing to *date*, is a waste of everyone’s time, especially those guys or girls writing to you because they think you’re interested in their gender.

    It’d be a lot simpler if we just had two sets of those “Interested in” checkboxes. “Looking for men as friends, looking for men and women for long-term relationships, and looking for women for casual sex” is a complete description, and doesn’t require any sort of label like straight/gay/bi on top of it.

  37. northbeach says:

    To quote wikipedia’s entry for “Chasing Amy, ” I’d identify as a lesbian-identified bisexual… meaning that I find both genders attractive, but have really only seen myself dating a woman in any serious/long-term fashion.

    In any event, when I was on OKC more actively, I did start out listing bisexual on my profile b/c that was most accurate… but then I was getting an overwhelming number of messages from guys (and not girls). At some point I realized that I wasn’t interested in trying to find a long-term male partner and switched it to gay… thus satisfying my desire to find a long-term female partner.

    fast forward to now… though I’d been exclusively with women for the past 7 years, I’m now dating a man… much to the confusion of all my friends… and in spite of this, i’d still identify as a “lesbian-identifed bisexual”.

    go figure.

  38. Uncleanya says:

    In your article, you mention metadata from jpegs. However, what if those jpegs have been photoshopped? Are you not counting photoshopped pics in your calculation of how dated a photo–that is, are you throwing away jpegs where the metadata indicates the photo is altered from the original?

  39. C9 says:

    I prefer the straight, gay or bi identification system vs, what you’re looking for at the moment. Why? Because 25+ years ago, my “bi” husband (then) was apparently into me at the moment but was really gay and in denial. You can talk yourselves into anything folks. Including 3 kids you can’t produce with another man. I know plenty of men who married women who “switched teams” after they got a couple of kids out of the way. They just woke up one day and decided they were into a woman. Right.

  40. Stephen G says:

    > We’ve found that taller people, up to a point, have more sex:

    The chart you illustrated indicates only that tall people “have more sex *partners*.”

    But that brings me to a question … how does OKCupid know how many sex partners a member has?

  41. Ben Artin says:

    I identify as bi, but I am not a Kinsey 3. Often, I find it difficult to find enjoyable same-gender partners, compared to finding enjoyable opposite-gender partners. Equally often, I wonder whether this is actually true (that my universe of highly compatible partners is gender-biased) or whether this is a biased perception.

    Something like this might figure into your bi-identified not-acting-bi users: they might be interested in men and women, but find it much harder to find one than the other. If they only initiate with highly compatible partners, but those are predominantly of one gender and not the other, they might only end up contacting one gender and not the other.

    I would be interested in seeing some more stats on bisexuality. For each bi user, messaging patterns are surely skewed, as are the two candidate pools. But are they equally skewed?

    And speaking about gender in general: why are you forcing us to choose a binary gender?

  42. Keith Twombley says:

    The bisexual messaging phenomenon gives weight to the suggestion that bisexual people be given an extra field to fill in indicating what they’re actually looking for. Do it, okc!

  43. Zach says:

    I would like to see something that focuses on just the lies of one gender versus the other. Like, how much, if any, do females lie about their bust size? Their income level? Do either have a sizable impact on how many messages they receive?

  44. Latisha McDaniel says:

    No disrepect to those sexy men out there but you’re a dime a dozen and always on the hunt. That is why I do not do excessive searching for single men. THEY ARE EVERYWHERE. I am sure that most bi men and women will agree with me on that. What is really hard is trying to find a gay man or woman who is okay with bisexuality. Because of all the negative stereotypes surrounding bisexuality, our online quest is usually for someone of the same sex. I go out to lesbian bars and when women find out I’m bi, they kinda cringe. I don’t have time or money to go out, buy drinks, search for women in a crowded bar, strike up a conversation in a noisy place only to be rejected at the end of the night. Which has led many of us go to the net.

    OkCupid, as a person who works in the medical research field, you need to leave the analysis to the professionals. This is pitiful excuse for a non-scientific study. This needs to be removed before it exposes even more of your lack of intelligence.

  45. Jim says:

    This was the first site I joined. With the intention of not ruling anything out, I listed myself as “Bi” and checked all the “looking for” boxes. From females, I have gotten LOL or outright scorn. From males, I have gotten invitations. So “messages by gender” ended up wildly unequal. I joined with few expectations, then reality veered off. I’m still open to suggestions …

  46. E says:

    Right, well, this bisexual woman is now going to delete her account. Not that I’ve ever messaged anyone, I just had an account because of quizzes, but the point stands. I’m married to someone of the opposite sex, so if I were ever going to message someone it would be someone of the same sex, so your stats would count me as a ‘non-bi’ person.

    Maybe my sexual identity is up to ME to determine and not some sleazy dating site.

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  48. wordeater says:

    In response to bisexuality…. I find it offensive how many assume that bi almost automatically means that you are only looking for a threesome. I have never been in a relationship on here and been scoping for a third. Though I have seen some who are. “It’s also a little unfair to claim that “three-fourths of your fantasies are, in fact, fantasies of a fantasy”. It makes men out to be hypersexual horndogs cruising the interwebs for bi women.” I do find more truth in my experience in this comment. It’s amazing, and disturbing, how many men/boys approach me about having a threesome fantasy moment. No thanks!! That is not how I want to be approached. I am honest in stating my bisexuality, as well as in the rest of my profile. I like both. I find it better to put it out there initially, which weeds out the jealous types. I mainly message men, because I believe I want to marry a man someday. I am open to dating women, and message them for friends or possibly more, but have never had a romantic relationship with one. Regardless, I always look for friends first. What I find more troubling, is the overwhelming number of people who are polyamorous. I agree that you should consider expanding your search criteria. It would help make better matches and lessen confusion. And speaking of matches, how the hell does someone who answers 20 questions and takes no tests have an 80% match with me?? That one really gets my goat.

    In regards to the older photos, I am very guilty of this. Why? Because I am always behind the camera, not in front of it. Also, my blackberry and Tmobile don’t allow me to upload my pics off of my phone, though I can text them. When I did try to upload them from my cell to your site, it wasn’t an option you offered. So, you’ll get newer pictures as I do, which isn’t often. Though, I tend to look the same over the years, and my weight can alter in a year, beyond what it does over longer spans of time. Besides, you can get enough of an idea of my looks from the range of my pics. If you only are interested in my looks and my body, I’m not terribly interested in you.

    Good luck!

  49. Samantha says:

    I’m female and I’m 24. Just recently I switched my profile setting from gay to bisexual. For me this was a pretty big deal mostly because in the past I’ve been admittedly arrogant and over critical of bisexuality and those who own it as a descriptive title. As for me. My commitments and relationship expectations have exclusively involved women for the last seven years. I came out as a lesbian at eighteen and committed to that identity since. As for men, I was never generally repelled by them as a gender, I just made the personal choice to engage in romantic relationships only with women.

    What I’d like to suggest is that there is something of a difference between sexual orientation (those whom a person chooses to engage sexually) and identity (a more internal concept which reflects how we see ourselves in relation to our surroundings). I, for example, Identify as a lesbian although I’ve been known to take sexual partners of both genders at various points in my life.

    As someone who is willing to take compatible partners of either gender I tend to use the term Bisexual only when I’m single. This is because I feel my sexual preferences should only be openly disclosed to individuals interested in engaging in a sexual experience or relationship with me and that when I’m single I could decide to engage with someone of either gender.

    To me the only real purpose of any title or term is to bring about understanding in regards to how you would like others to see you. This is why label are generally more for the sake of others than for one’s self.

    Once I’m actually in a relationship with a person of a specific gender then I might clearly state that I’m engaging is a homosexual or heterosexual (more like this is my GF/BF) relationship because obviously that’s in reference to the gender of my partner at that specific time. The fact that I’m willing to engage to some degree with both genders becomes a moot point once I’m involved.

    Now I will admit that when I’m in social environments where the subject of my orientation is of particular interest (like at a sci-fi/fantasy convention where I’m more likely to be hit on), I have been known to tell people different things. For example say a man comes up to me that I don’t find attractive but who clearly thinks I’m attractive and who would like to proposition me. I will often tell this person that I’m exclusively interested in woman because it allows me to not only deflect his unwanted interest but also lessens the chance that he’ll try again to proposition me even though I’ve already turned down his original advance.

    Likewise if an attractive woman hits on me and inquires I’m more likely to be ambiguous about the full nature of my sexuality while still making it very clear I’m interested in her.

    While some people might criticism me for this I feel it’s the most rational way to go about my dating life. For one I only engage in one relationship at a time, so unless someone wants to know my actual sexual history for practical reasons it’s really my choice how much I’m willing to disclose at any given time and frankly none of anyone’s business.

    Going back to the subject of my recent profile switch for a moment…

    When people do ask me why I’ve changed my setting I tell them honestly that it’s really a matter of circumstance. While I will almost always take a interested woman over an interested man as a sexual partner (A fact which seems to go against the common trend of bisexual woman preferring men over women), the truth of the matter is that sexually I’m rather indifferent.

    Sex is sex and a meaningfully emotional romantic relationship is something different.

    Some people can separate emotional love/connection, while others can’t. I’m one who can.

    Furthermore, I live in an area that affords me very little contact with the GLBT community and therefore it can be very difficult to find available female partners to engage with that are both single and cannot be socially/romantically connected to any of my other queer friends and acquaintances. With that said I’m not about to go around living like a nun either and, assuming the individual is to my liking, I have absolutely no problem taking a male lover instead.

    But then because I identify as a lesbian I’m also less likely to develop an emotional attachment and cultivate a full blown relationship with a male lover. Just as I’m more likely to take on a purely casual physical relationship with a man than a woman since, with a woman, I would hope for a long term relationship to develop.

    See? Our motivations involved in ex and relationships are hardly ever black and white which is why such labels can be so limiting.

    In the end people want what and who they want and while we maybe feel more comfortable putting specific names and titles to these things so that we may better understand ourselves and communicate that understanding to others; how we interpret these words and the reasons people use them don’t always coincide.

    Personally I’m not so interested in what a person is. Rather, I’m more interested in why chose to identify a certain way.

  50. Will says:

    The date on this post is wrong – it was published today, July 13, not July 7.