How Your Race Affects The Messages You Get

October 5th, 2009 by Christian Rudder

Welcome back, dorks. We’ve processed the messaging habits of over a million people and are about to basically prove that, despite what you might’ve heard from the Obama campaign and organic cereal commercials, racism is alive and well. It would be awesome if other big websites would go out on a limb and release their own race data, too. I can’t imagine they will: multi-million dollar enterprises rarely like to admit that the people generating those millions act like turds. But being poor gives us a certain freedom. To alienate all our users. So there.

When I first started looking at first-contact attempts and who was writing who back, it was immediately obvious that the sender’s race was a huge factor. Here are just a handful of the numbers that illustrate that:

The takeaway here is that although race shouldn’t matter in messaging, it does. A lot.

First of all, how do we know that race shouldn’t matter? Are we just making some after-school-special assumption that “true love is colorblind?” more compatibility usually
means more replies
No, we’re not: we know race shouldn’t matter to replies because the races all match each other more or less evenly, and reply rate correlates to matching. That is, more compatibility generally means more replies.

On OkCupid you create your own unique matching system, and that means your better matches are people you actually want talk to. Below is a graph showing match percentages vs. reply rates for a random sample of 500,000 people.As you can see, in general, the better you match someone, the more likely you are to reply to a first message from them.

We can see this principle in action when we look at our trusty control, the Zodiac. Here are the match and reply rates side-by-side, with similar rates colored yellow. There’s no real need to inspect the numbers; just observe the similar colors.

  • Throughout this post, yellowish colors are short-hand for “neutral” and red and green indicate “strong preference.”

People of the various Zodiac signs match each other all at roughly the average rate, and, as we would expect, they reply to messages similarly. In general, the correlation between match percentage and reply rate means that whenever we compare the match/reply charts for a given breakdown of the population, they should look about the same. However, this, like so many other fine assumptions, totally breaks down when race gets involved:

Again, don’t bother squinting, just check out the colors. We’ll soon look very closely at these tables.

So here’s last week’s compatibility by race table (I explained how we can confidently measure “compatibility” in that post). This is a blow-up of the leftmost table above:

As you can see, the races all match each other roughly evenly: good news. It means all other things being equal, two people, of whatever race, should have the same chance to have a successful relationshp. But now let’s look at the table of how individuals actually reply to each other’s messages. First we’ll examine messages sent by men to women (I know our gay readers are interested in same-sex versions of these tables, there’s a link to them here and at the end of this post):

The numbers on the perimeter of the table are the weighted average rates for each column/row. Here’s what we can know:

  • Black women write back the most. Whether it’s due to talkativeness, loneliness, or a sense of plain decency, black women are by far the most likely to respond to a first contact attempt. In many cases, their response rate is one and a half times the average, and, overall, black women reply about a quarter more often that other women.
  • White men get more responses. Whatever it is, white males just get more replies from almost every group. We were careful to preselect our data pool so that physical attractiveness (as measured by our site picture-rating utility) was roughly even across all the race/gender slices. For guys, we did likewise with height.
  • White women prefer white men to the exclusion of everyone else—and Asian and Hispanic women prefer them even more exclusively. These three types of women only respond well to white men. More significantly, these groups’ reply rates to non-whites is terrible. Asian women write back non-white males at 21.9%, Hispanic women at 22.9%, and white women at 23.0%. It’s here where things get interesting, for white women in particular. If you look at the match-by-race table before this one, the “should-look-like” one, you see that white women have an above-average compatibility with almost every group. Yet they only reply well to guys who look like them. There’s more data on this towards the end of the post.

Let’s see what happens when it’s the women writing the messages to men.

  • Men don’t write black women back. Or rather, they write them back far less often than they should. Black women reply the most, yet get by far the fewest replies. Essentially every race—including other blacks—singles them out for the cold shoulder.
  • White guys respond less overall. The average reply rate of non-white males is 48.1%, while white guys’ is only 40.5%. Basically, they write back about 20% less often. It’s ironic that white guys are worst responders, because as we saw above they in turn get the most replies. That has apparently made them very self-absorbed.

Finally, here are a couple tables that shed further light on our discussion. These are site-wide answers to a couple user-written match questions. They barely need any explanation: one comments on the other, really. Together they shed more light on the theory/practice schizophrenia of people’s racial attitudes.



It’s surely not just OkCupid users that are like this. In fact, it’s any dating site (and indeed any collection of people) would likely exhibit messaging biases similar to what I’ve written up. Any dating site probably
has these biases
According to our internal metrics, at least, OkCupid’s users are better-educated, younger, and far more progressive than the norm, so I can imagine that many sites would actually have worse race stats. But like I said at the beginning, we’ll probably never know. See you next week.


(Addendum to original post)

Same-Sex Data for Race vs. Reply Rates

As promised, here are the same-sex versions of last week’s charts and tables. In general, they show that straights and gays share many of the same inclinations, but the prejudices of the latter are perhaps a bit less pronounced. I should say at the top that some of the sample sizes for the various race/gender slices presented here are rather small (for instance, OkCupid doesn’t have many lesbians of Indian descent), and that accounts, I think, for some of the scatter-shot nature of the color tables. Race preferences are not nearly as stark here as they are with the heterosexual data.

See for yourself:

Still, there are a few conclusions we can draw:

  • Blacks get fewer responses. We saw this with the straight data, too, and here it’s true of both gay and lesbian senders. Black gay men get over 20% fewer responses than non-blacks, which is about how straight black men fared. Black women, on the other hand, do relatively much better with gays than straights. While they’re still the least replied-to group, the discrepancy is much smaller in the lesbian community.
  • Whites respond by far the least to anyone.. Both white lesbians and white gay men write the fewest replies. In fact, across the two charts, whites respond about 15% less often than non-whites, and white gay men show a marked preference for other whites. On the other hand, gay white women don’t have the segregationist tendencies of their straight counterparts; they just dis everyone. Whereas last week we saw that straight white women strongly preferred other whites to the exclusion of other groups, lesbian whites respond to all 9 racial groups roughly evenly, and, in general, the lesbian community seems relatively colorblind. Only Indian lesbians receive a response rate far off the average, and as I said above, the sample size there is limited and the results might be skewed by chance.
  • Asian lesbians are in demand, and they’re picky about other races. Gay Asian females are replied to the most, and, among the well-represented groups, they have the most defined racial preferences: they respond very well to other Asians, Whites, Native Americans, and Middle Easterners, but very poorly to the other groups. Latin women also express a clear preference, for Whites and Asians.
  • Men prefer Middle Easterners. Gay men and straight men both respond best to Middle Easterners, and the preference is quite dramatic. I’d be interested to hear any theories why this is so.

As we did last week, we can see that all groups think, theoretically, that interracial relationships are acceptable, yet again whites are the least willing to have such a relationship themselves. This time it’s the men, not the women, who prefer most to keep to their own: it’s interesting that both in reply patterns and in their answers to these two match questions, the behavior of white straight women and white gay men are so closely parallel.

To our friends in the gay and lesbian communities: thanks for being patient and waiting for this data. We will do gay-centric articles in the future, I promise. Lately, since we’ve been dealing with complex and data-intensive subjects like race and reply rates, we’ve had to restrict ourselves to straight data in the primary post. We felt that adding a discussion of gay and lesbian trends alongside straight ones would triple the length of an already long and dense post and surely more than triple reader confusion. We will keep looking for ways to present the information you rightly expect; for now, it will be in addenda such as this one.

1,557 Responses to “How Your Race Affects The Messages You Get”

  1. Richard says:

    @Jessie

    “I asked a question akin to this earlier and got cricket sounds. I don’t understand why American girls don’t seem to appreciate Indian and Asian guys, and I don’t think I ever will.”

    It’s not just a matter of assimilation, it’s also a [larger] matter of representation. To be succint, western culture has historically portrayed Asian females and males very differently. Asian females are exotic, hyper-feminine, docile, porcelain-like, holders of mysterious sexual secrets, willing to please westerners who seek them out, ready to be freed from restrictive Asian society, etc. Asian males are puny, weak (and yet oppressive at the same time), emotionless, geeky, nerdy, frail, timid, etc. What I’m about to say is hyperbole of course, but western culture sees an Asian woman with an Asian man and thinks, “Hmm, I can give her better.”

    This sort of representation is internalized by women and men the world over, and you see the results every day. There’s a lot more single Asian men than single Asian women. It is THE divisive issue in the Asian American community. Neither party is necessarily at fault, but neither wishes to compromise, or even knows how to for that matter. Asian women embrace their increased social mobility, as they should, while Asian men are pissed that they’re left out in the cold, as they should be.

    As an Asian male, I’m both frustrated and encouraged by conversations such as this one on OKC. On one hand, I think, “This conversation reaffirms that no one gets it.” On the other hand, I think, “Well, at least this conversation will make more people get it.”

    Ultimately, what I hope will result from such conversations is a gradual self-awareness. I’ll analogize it to my experience as an educator. I fully admit that I make unconscious knee-jerk reactions to students when they enter my classroom. Because of the way they look, I can’t help but expect certain things from them, or not expect certain things from them. However, I know that’s not because I’m a bad person, it’s just because I’ve been socially conditioned to think that way. And, because I’m aware the judgments I’m making, I can and do force myself re-evaluate my opinions and give those students a blank slate. If I wasn’t aware of what I was doing, those students’ slates would never be blank.

    Same with this. I’m hoping that one woman on OKC will read this and think, “Hmm, I never thought about that, but it makes sense.” Then, she will receive a message from an Asian man and think, “He seems nice, but I’m not attracted to him.” However, instead of calling it a day, she will also think, “Wait, am I not attracted to him because he’s not attractive, or because I’ve been socially conditioned to think he’s not attractive?” She’ll then force herself to wipe the slate clean, give him a chance, and see what happens.

    Wishful thinking, but you never know.

  2. GucciMang says:

    Are y’all still in here really competing and begging for white people’s attention? Sad, especially for Black people. Both Black men and women are at the bottom of the totem pole, along with Asian and Indian men. They don’t want us, get over it and learn to love yourself, your culture, and your own race. If you did, white people not liking you would have zero effect on you the way it doesn’t affect me (I probably find white women the least attract honestly, above only Asian women).

    And for the white people who are going to look at that comment I just made and try to pull that reverse racism bullshit on me, keep in mind I never thought it was racist for you to prefer your own to begin with. I just think minorities need to do the same. After all, whats good for the goose (so to speak, not putting white people separate from other races) is good for the gander. I know that if that did happen though, white people would be sick to death over it. Because that would mean they were no longer the standard of beauty that they’ve worked so hard to be in the past and are currently working so hard to be in the media now.

  3. Marc says:

    KTChong, just because that is the way it is doesn’t mean I should put up with it. The concept of “whiteness” was a trick developed by the elites of colonial USA to prevent indentured European servants and African slaves from getting together and rebelling against the powers that existed. That trick worked and now the concept of “whiteness” is something that is widespread.
    You stated that Asian men and African-American women are often considered the least desired as far as dating by other people. Where to African-American men(particularly of the nerdy variety) stand?
    I am kind of cynical. With that cynicism comes a sense of needing to do something about the things that are wrong with the world.

  4. anthracite says:

    black male here.

    I think it’s quite easy to understand why almost everyone wants the white man or woman. This site is north-american based site and north-america is predominantly european rooted society culturally and demographically. So europeans are the majority race here. Europeans are also in charge of this society. They’re a dominant majority ( there exist other societies where social dominance and numerical preponderance are decoupled).

    To those who immigrate into north-america can’t help being influenced by that proponderance. Thus non white men and women are very interested in the white folks.

    The case of black people is different. I was always of the impression that black women were the *least* interested in other races of men so Okcupid’s result is surprising.
    I think the answer to shis mystery is that black women on OKCUPID are not typical at all. Okcupid has often been described as populated with a lot of well educated, progressive, stuff white people like, irony loving, pabst blue ribbon drinking left leaning white folks. Now which black women might feel comfortable even sticking around here ? Those who are already very atypical and very likely to be into white men anyways , I’d think.
    The non-black males don’t yet realise that the black females on this site are not the ones they’re used to seeing on tv or even in real life.

    I don’t think we can totally rule out some natural, biologically rooted tendencies. Pale skin is treasured among the midle-easterners, the asians and the indians. For those who say “colonialism !”, please get educated and start by looking at the artistic representation of ideal women in those cultures. You will see that asians, midle easterners and indians have loved pale skinned women for a very very long time. Don’t believe me, check it ! Just the same, dark skinned women have not been held in favour among those people, for a very very long time ! Does anyone remember that passage in the song of solomon where one lady pleads that even though she is sunburnt, she should still be seen as beautiful ?
    That seems to me to reflect a culture where pale skin in women was prized. There is work in anthropology which shows that in almost all cultures the ideal is for men to be darker than their women and for women to be paler than their man.

    I have another example. Anthropological research and common sense tells us that most men the world over find the hourglass shape very attractive. I’m even more certain that most men also find the women with male-pattern adiposity not attractive ( ie , women whose fat is concentrated in the belly, which is typical of male adiposity). Now, there is an ethnic group in my country in whom this male typical fatness is very very prevalent. It almost looks like they all look like that. I claim that most men, from all over the world, would find those women relatively unattractive. It’d have nothing to do with the media but everyting to do with actually objective criteria.

  5. Keith says:

    This analysis makes a few unstated assumptions. With respect to the data analysis:

    1) The proportion of people who report their ethnic affiliation is representative for all groups, and there is no important difference between those who report and those who do not.
    2) Response rate corresponds with level of interest, and does so equally for every group analysed. As Melanie pointed out, a ‘response’ to a first message is not necessarily a positive one. The fact that resposnse rate correlates with match% is suggestive, but not conclusive

    Probably more importantly, with respect to the conclusion:

    3) Racial dating preferences are either a form of racism, or a reflection of it.

    The meaning of the word ‘racism’ has been modified by various groups to suit their own purposes, so that in order to support the to conclusion that these data show that “racism is alive and well”, the author should state both which definition he is using, and which of the possible premises outlined above he believe the data indicate.

  6. Longhronprof says:

    This was very interesting. I will not discuss the argument of preference or racism as so many people have articulated their perspective well on this. However I do want to point out a study done in The Sociological Quarterly that collaberates most of these findings. The only read difference is that the author finds that blacks are less open to interracially date than other racial groups. It may be because the author looks at what people state in their dating ad and not at the response rates for letters sent. As noted there are reasons why response rates of letters may not be a good way to assess racial acceptance. But there are potential problems with using the stated preferences in the advertisments as well. If any of you are interested in the article you can find it in Sociological Quarterly volume 50, Number 1 starting on page 121.

  7. Adamah says:

    You controlled for differences in height and appearance, which I commend you for. However, did you account for differences in message content, profile content, education levels, etc? After all, white males tend to have higher levels of education than black males, which matches tend to value. While I’m pretty sure race does play a factor, you should control for all variables before declaring that racism is alive and well.

  8. Chris says:

    I think this article is very enlightening. It makes me realize what a shitty world we live in. Sure attraction is necessary in a relationship but the bottom line is attraction should be the last thing one looks for in a match. Kind of like “icing on the cake” You put frosting on a piece of shit and youre still eating a piece of shit. The first bite might be tasty but the second you hit the shit youll feel sorry. Most of the women I know are single and unhappy and all I seem to hear is a ton of complaining about how they will never be happy. Or they cannot find the right guy. I just think that astetic prefrence seems to be the driving factor. Leading me to believe that if you want to be satisfied you have to have a man who looks good and the rest is up to speculation. You take a gamble with something as fragile as your heart and soul and chance it because the outside looks good. Why not just be friendly and talk to the person who replies to you? Statistics and phrases like “If you have pictures people are much more likely to respond” or “if you are a white male you will get more responses” Show that women that are online looking for love arent looking for love. They are looking for fools gold and sorry if I am being offensive but women in todays society are fucking morons and incredibly foolish. If youre offended sure be offended but the fact of the matter is you are alot less likely to find someone to treat you good because you wouldnt know what a good thing is if it held a door open for you or smiled at you or wrote you a love letter. I for one know how to find important qualities in a woman and I am very happy now because I tried something diffrent. My girlfriend and I are 2 completely diffrent people. I am middle eastern with darker skin and she is white. I am athletic and popular, educated and well liked with an amazing career. My girlfriend is a student, very nerdy quiet and shy. She is not even my type because I like tall darker skinned women. I gave her a chance and went out on a date with her and fell in love shortly after because I found she had all of the qualities a good woman should have. Attentive, Sweet, Funny, Charismatic, Smart, Selfless, the list goes on. Now If I wouldnt have dated her and just went out that night with the hot chick I met at the coffee shop I probably wouldnt be in the situation I am in now. Word from the wise… If you want to be happy go outside and talk to people work on your people skills and evaluate what you want and dont go looking for it in the handsome Brad Pitt lookalike, broaden youre scope and look for it in short guys, tall guys, fat guys, skinny guys, black, white, orange, man, woman. Just focus on whats important to your happiness. Thats all I have to say… take it from someone who’s happy now and wouldnt trade it for the world, just open your damn eyes and your heart will follow.

  9. mistekal says:

    Honestly, I don’t think reply rates really demonstrates whether or not there’s racism happening.
    I’ve been contacted by men of all races, and I look at each of their profile.
    I simply don’t write back if there’s something about his profile that I don’t like. Sometimes it’s what he wrote, sometimes it’s his age, sometimes it’s the fact that he smokes.
    etc.etc.etc.

    I would hate for you guys to take my response rate, have it show that I usually respond more to white guys when in reality I open every single message and look at everyone’s profile, no matter what the race.

    I think a much more accurate way to show how race affects dating trends would be to do a percentage of each race and how often they select their own race in the match criteria!
    That would show that they do not want to even SEE the profile of those of another race.

  10. anon says:

    is that racism or ethnocentrism? We need to differentiate. Youre allowed to have preferences as to who you interact with, its part of the freedom of being human, the right to pick and choose based off of nothing more than the color of someone’s skin. Racism is an active hatred of another race. Some of my best friends are black, I have nothing against black people as a race, but as far as black women Im simply not attracted to them as easily as I am to white women. is that a bad thing? Does that label me a racist?

  11. AndThatsWhyYoureSingle says:

    I have an idea….

    Why not take the earnest and effort you used to come up with this transparent attempt at page views and crosslinking and invest them in marketing your service to more/better quality members?

    I’ve logged on every day since joining about 3 weeks ago. I’ve counted…at most…10-15 (and 15 is being generous) new profiles max in my age range of 38-50 as of today.

    I’m not sure what your business model is, or how/if you generate any revenue from this website. But if your plan is to convert free memberships to paid ones, I think you need to seriously up your game and show us why we should hand over $10 a month to you guys.

    I get that marketing budgets are tight. But word of mouth is everything and its free. Be more selective about the evangelists you have out there promoting your service, stop promoting to the “craigslist” audience and offer better content. And maybe lose the whole frat boy lingo and tone. That alone tells me why you rarely get any new members over 35.

  12. AndThatsWhyYoureSingle says:

    And as for the $10 membership?

    Cheap membership, cheap crowd. Period.

  13. msmarmitelover says:

    Extremely interesting.
    Living in London, which is very multicultural, I never realised that I have an advantage just being a white woman. Good wake up call…
    Can you do the same trends with age?

  14. PhastPhreddy says:

    You want to expose prejudice? How about a survey of responses to fat women and men? But then, what is prejudice, but simply a preconception of what we want and expect. Certain types of women light my fire and others don’t, big deal. So, most white males prefer white females. Newsflash!

  15. Right says:

    re y’all still in here really competing and begging for white people’s attention? Sad, especially for Black people. Both Black men and women are at the bottom of the totem pole, along with Asian and Indian men. They don’t want us, get over it and learn to love yourself, your culture, and your own race. If you did, white people not liking you would have zero effect on you the way it doesn’t affect me (I probably find white women the least attract honestly, above only Asian women).

    And for the white people who are going to look at that comment I just made and try to pull that reverse racism bullshit on me, keep in mind I never thought it was racist for you to prefer your own to begin with. I just think minorities need to do the same. After all, whats good for the goose (so to speak, not putting white people separate from other races) is good for the gander. I know that if that did happen though, white people would be sick to death over it. Because that would mean they were no longer the standard of beauty that they’ve worked so hard to be in the past and are currently working so hard to be in the media now.
    __________________________________________________________________
    You’re making sense GucciMang. Whites get a real kick out of all these races wanting to date/marry them. And it gives them and even more perverse thrill to say–I prefer my own so deal with it. Since it’s all encoded in the genes and is just natural–whatever. You know what would change if more races started to prefer their own or other people of color en masse and Whites were the last choice–then I wonder how they would feel then.

    Still I think it is unhealthy to whimper, whine and whinge on and on about White people prefer and twisting oneself in a knot about why Whites don’t find Black people attractive. You are not going to convince them anyway that you are human and an individual and they are not going to see you anyway–so why waste valuable energy and time-wondering and pining for the validation and affection of White people. There are so many interesting Black and other people of color in this world and the great thing is most white people have already dismissed them as beneath them anyway.

  16. Daniel Howard says:

    You guys planning to analyse height? It would be interesting to know what the reply rate is versus height difference . . .

    -d

  17. snacky says:

    To Fenchurch

    If you read the start of the blog carefully, you will see that they said those numbers are coming out shortly. They are doing them separately.

  18. C says:

    Interesting stuff. I’m a white woman, and I tend to reply to everyone, (even if to say I don’t think we’re compatible.)

    Exceptions:
    *one word/sentence messages.
    *poetry with nothing else. (I got the same love sonnet twice from one guy. It’s a bit much.)
    *Men who want casual sex partners. (I respect their honesty, but that’s NOT what I’m looking for.)
    *Men who tell me I’m beautiful/pretty but say nothing about ME. (For the record: I’m not saying I’m stunning, this is just something that happens on occasion.)
    *Men whose only picture is them in front of something really expensive… and they are shirtless.

    As it turns out, in my experience, many of these are from non-whites. (Although I did just delete a message from a white guy that said, “let’s chat sometime.” Um, why?)

    I’ve dated across the racial spectrum. It’s not that I have a strong preference, but if someone isn’t going to put even a little effort into contacting me, I’m not going to put in the effort to respond.

  19. jared says:

    Just like a lot of people, you are quick to pull use the term “racist”. as a white male, im mostly attracted to white girls. So if im not attracted to black or indian chicks… I must be a racist. or does that make me a bigot? Racism is a supremacy thing. I dont find myself to be “supreme” to anyone. YOU to read the dictionary.

  20. Betty says:

    The intro to the blog on the home page, “We basically prove, using you guys’ race-based messaging habits, that racism is alive and well”, is not only misleading but inaccurate. The research done for this blog is great and does prove the title above, race affects whether people write you back, but not racism. Whether or not people chose to write you back is a prefrence, a prefrence to be prejudice if anything.

    One can def say that racism could be a contributing factor to who writes/replies to whom and how often but the data that was collected for this blog and the manner that it was collected does not prove racism.

    Prejudice maybe, racism not

  21. Dee says:

    I am amused that so many whites are sooo offended by this. Fact is for whatever reason on this site there does appear to be a difference in the responses based on race. The ones that should be angry about this situation are Black women, but in my case I have more important things to be upset about.

    I tend to prefer the looks of men with darker skin, hair and eyes and this can vary from olive to black. However, I have met men of all races that I have found attractive even if they didn’t fit my original preference and I have dated many of them.

    This is because while I have a preference, I also recognize that there are many forms of attractiveness and the physical one is not the only one, not the most important one.

    I would never say “Well I could never date that person, they are “insert race here” becasue that would be… well racist lol!

    Really, would you say “well that person is smart, funny good looking and I love being around them, but darned they don’t have red hair, oh well can’t date them” That would just be silly!

    Black women are not some monolithic group, you have African American women, women from the islands, from Africa (very different from country to country), and you have black women of mixed race. We are so diverse that the idea that you can’t date us because you are just not attracted to black women is laughable. We range in color from golden to midnight black, news flash we are people just like you…. We are rich, poor, well educated, not well educated. Loud, quiet and so on.

    This is true of every race under the sun.

    To those whining about the test and the possibility that OMG because I don’t date people of other races I might gasp be racist” grow up for crying out loud. So you might have racist tendencies deal with it!

    It is interesting, in my case, I answer all my mail because it is polite to do so, but there is also the possibility that because I have so few matches it is easier to do so?

    But this is a good thing, why on earth would I want to date someone who is as shallow as not to date someone ONLY because of their race?

  22. Holm says:

    The hidden stereotypes I grew up with:

    -White men are nasty. They drink and beat their wives. They may be rich, but they are stressed out easily, bad tempers, racist, and travel overseas to sleep with Asian BOYS, because they are pedophiles.They have beer bellys and complain about people of color, deny being racist, and justify their racism. They think they are smart but have no clue.

    -White women are easy. They will SLEEP with anything. They drink a lot, are conveniently bisexual and the Black men that sleep with the them are using them for their money. They are dirty and fat, and they age bad. They are victims and overly emotional. Very naive. Bad physical shape-not like a REAL woman. They smell like dogs.

    -Asian women are fetishes. They are quiet, submissive and date white men who use them. They are mail order brides who think that Black people are mean and bad. They can barely speak English. Physically shaped like a 9 year old boy.

    -Asian men are nerdy and helpful. They are passive and shy.

    -Hispanic men are chauvinistic but very masculine. They work several jobs but get paid very little.

    -Hispanic women have attitude problems. They wear tight pants, big hoop earrings, and like to impress White people. They like to fight and curse at you.

    -Black men are sexy. They are hyper-masculine, aggressive, but are the only men that can fully please you sexually. Have hard luck, face racism but are homophobic and sexist.

    -Black women are conservative sexually. They have to put people in their place and can probably beat up the average white man. Smarter than their male counterparts, have alot to prove to fight racial and gender stereotypes.

    Native Americans-everyone claims to be one.

    Middle eastern men-chauvinistic, overly religious

    Middle eastern women-submissive, quiet, overly religious.

    Indian men-very smart.

    It took me a long time to realize that NOT all people were like the stereotypes that my parents and people around me reinforced. I would walk around all day and I would be amongst white people and NEVER see them. I would walk past them, and couldn’t tell one from the other-literally. Growing up in an urban area, white men would come in with a Black woman and my dad would say “He is so nasty and fat. She must be a prostitute.” My dad never told me not to date outside my race, but he made it perfectly clear that people that were not brown were OTHERS. They would only date me because they were nasty and had a sick fetish to have sex with a Black woman. He made it clear that white men could never be healed from racism, and thus could never be compatible or understand what my daily struggles. So, I would never even LOOK at white men. Never. It was like “white men? Eww.” I know so many Black women who feel this same way. Just the mere thought of having “no eligible Black men” and to settle for white men, for many of my Black girl friends is a dreaded thing. It wasn’t until I began to have interracial friendships did I realize how ignorant and mis-informed I was. Even though every “white man” I came in contact with, or “saw” on tv, seemed to reaffirm this. It wasn’t real. IT WAS RACIST. So, I don’t want us to think that all Black people worship the ground that White people walk on-this is far from true. Black women practice endogamy (Black on Black) marriage more than any other group in America. I think it is because of these stereotypes. Black people will be cordial to Whites, but some deep inside look at them with extreme disgust. It is very unfortunate that we all harbor racist ideas. The best thing that we can do is SEE people. Don’t be colorblind, that is condescending. See people for who they are-humans. And you will find beauty in all races.

  23. speculator says:

    I was rather surprised to see that women seem to have a stronger racial bias than men in this area. But perhaps there’s more to it than that. I always figured that women based their choices more on how much money a man has, or how successful they perceive him to be (or likely to become). After all, evolution has programmed them to select mates who are best able to provide for them, right? In the US, white men tend to be more financially successful than others (largely due to having more opportunities). Might this be at least part of the reason women of all ethnicities are favoring white men? Not because of how they look, but for what they can provide?

    Just a thought.

  24. Mia says:

    As long as we live in a society dominated by whites, they will always appear to be more “desirable” to others. You don’t see too many positive images of black women and asian men in the media. Asian men are never depicted as being masculine unless they are in a martial arts film. Like someone stated above, Sanjay Gupta is one of few Asian males I see on television on a daily basis. The vast majority of images I see on tv are white people. They are grossly overrepresented on nearly every station.

    Just turn on the TV and watch “Hollywood’s hottest women” or some crap like that. Out of 100 women 86 of them are probably white. There may be a token black (Halle Berry and Beyonce), Latina (Eva Mendez, Eva Longoria), or Asian (Lucy Lu) on the list. Everything is so heavily dominated by whites in the media. You would think there were no attractive women of other races. And the white women chosen as the “hottest” half of them are average looking. The media has a lot to do with how people view others and even how they view themselves.

  25. Mia says:

    And another note. Most black women are not looking into dating outside of their race. However, black women who sign up for dating sites like OKCupid are more than likely NOT looking for black men. The same can be said for a few of the other groups of people too IMO.

  26. keishaun says:

    sooo, it’s interesting that all these people think that black women are fat…great let’s beat up on us some more. I really didn’t need this dumb study…just makes me feel worse.

    and of course…nobody is sees color right? black women are just single, fat, uncultured losers…right. It’s always our fault.

  27. Middle east girl says:

    t’s interesting that white males do manage to reply to Middle Eastern women. Is there some kind of emergent fetish there? As Middle Easterners are becoming America’s next racial bogeyman, maybe there’s some kind of forbidden fruit thing going on. (Perhaps a reader more up-to-date on his or her Post-Colonial Theory can step in here? Just kidding. Don’t.)

    middle eastren girls are sexy and into white boys!

  28. thecrazycatman says:

    First of all, I’m the same poster as “Nah.” a while back.

    I appreciate the comments from fellow Indian men Silent Male and Richard. You both have done a great job of articulating the problems we face. I was quite stunned when I saw these results. I showed it to my older sister and my mother. My mom, who came to Canada in the 1970s and married my dad because of family pressure, has said before that she would go back and probably marry a white man. My sister, after seeing the survey, made excuses for the behaviour of white women and told me she will probably end up marrying a white man as well. She sees herself as extremely educated and independent and not at all traditional. In fact, she sees tradition as a weakness. She still doesn’t realize how her likeliness to marry white only shifts her slavery from Indian tradition to the slavery of the North American media. I see everyone equally, but after all this I told her I’d prefer it if she married a minority, any minority. I don’t see this as racist, but ultimately as the proper thing.

    My rationale was that white people can’t possibly understand the struggle of minorities, and I think that’s been issued very clearly in these replies. It seems an overwhelming majority want to justify this ill-treatment as a matter of preference and not one of racism. Not only are they denying the aforementioned effects of the media, they are justifying their lack of education about the different ways of the world. I never liked romantic comedies until I discovered Woody Allen. I never liked dark chocolate until I tried it again recently. I told myself for a long time that I didn’t find black women attractive, but I’ve realized this isn’t true.

    I’ve made a conscious effort to explore and learn constantly, to eliminate any prejudices that I may still have. They are, quite simply, inexcusable. The defense of preference is only legitimizing closed-mindedness and an end to learning and exploring. I was born and raised in Canada to an Indian family. My parents were from Africa. My friends growing up were mostly Muslim in a town dominated by Chinese. There were so few whites and blacks in my grade that most people would be able to name them off-hand. I didn’t keep in touch with those friends. I met a few Indian people along the way, naturally. I never felt a special affinity for them. I went to Europe and met a Northern Irish guy and an Italian guy who were practically my brothers for a few months. That finally cemented the insignificance of race once and for all, until I saw this survey.

    What makes it even harder for us is that we grew into this. I don’t have my own Indian culture to go back to, like some suggested we should do. Canada is my life. If I’m not accepted here, then I really have no other options. I’m usually a Canadian, until every few months or years I’m confronted with a reality: some ignorant bigots see me as “another kind” when I did nothing to warrant that kind of impression. They expect me to spend time with that kind rather than their kind just because that’ll make them a bit more comfortable, and they could go on longer without having to think about non-whites. This is the behaviour of most people who don’t live close to major cities.

    I see the same patterns. Indian and Asian women get together with white guys and turn their backs on the rest of us. Women like my sister see nothing wrong with this, because they don’t have to face the same issues as we do. I guess that’s why I made the suggestion to her: because it seems like consciously or not, she’s buying in to the double standard. She’s justifying the way our media has made us look. I will always consider myself a Canadian first, but that doesn’t change my skin colour.

  29. brainsauce says:

    That’s awesome that you guys made this information available — interesting stuff

  30. Chris says:

    I find it odd that various societies deem it acceptable to have preferences in height, weight, eye/hair color, and body structure… yet, people are labeled as racists when they have preferences in skin color. It’s all genetic (unless you modify your appearance).

    The reason this is such a big deal is because of the actions of the thousands of idiotic white folk in the past millennium and the continuing consequences of their actions in the present day.

    When will we see skin color as nothing more than genetic variations in alleles?

    Racism is still present–it will take decades, perhaps centuries, to snuff out. But something else will always be there to replace racism. Humans are stupid–we have irrational fears. Injustices will never end. The best we can do is to combat it–we must also be patient… which is understandably quite hard.

    The type of racism being described here is difficult to combat—it is more hidden; it’s almost inert. All races are legally equal… but that does not mean that all races are treated equally by everyone. Sadly there is little that can be done to remedy this—there is no way to force people to reject racism in a free society. Education is our best tool. Time will help a lot too, but time takes ‘time.’

    I think some here are tired of being called racists or being blamed for the actions of white folks before them. Understand… prejudices have to be taught to children—this is why we should not place 100% of the blame on those who are still racist today. These cycles need to be broken… and they are being broken. Once again, takes time though.

    But what do I know… I’m a white 25 year old male who lives in the whitest and oldest state in the Union.

  31. purpleraiinnnnnn says:

    This is a really interesting blog, I’m glad this site is doing something worthwhile with all the annoying questions we answer.

    The comments on here are good also, especially holm your stereotypes were HILARIOUS I laughed so hard, especially at the white people ones. I’m glad you were able to rise above your environment though.

    OK Cupid you should do a study based on aggressiveness.

  32. John says:

    So white males were #1 in the male group and middle eastern females #1 in the female group. Interesting. I guess that’s why Marc Antony and Cleopatra are considered to be the hottest couple of all time :)

  33. jonathan says:

    It’s pretty awesome that the management of this site allowed this to be compiled.

    I don’t really use this site that often; but this makes me like this site a lot more.

    Jonathan

  34. PrettyBlackGirl says:

    Sigh, whatever… I am a pretty, smart, cultured black girl in my twenties who knows that I only need one man. Who cares if the majority will not love or accept me? I only need ONE!

  35. GucciMang says:

    @Chris

    Thousands of idiotic white people? Try millions. And try millions today too.

  36. Jerry says:

    This had the be one of the BEST studies on interracial dating, but it is presented in the WORST possible way. The author should not even used the word racist in the study. The discussion above my post is completely “broken” as a result. Seems like we aren’t discussing the relevant things.

  37. Joel says:

    I think these numbers would change if there were two more columns on race, like there are in the Ethnicity options: Undeclared and blank. Perhaps the thing that’s not identical, referred to by commenter ‘Z’ (and quoted below) is that the less racist people tend not to declare or to leave Ethnicity blank. Though it may change the results, it won’t make them exactly great, I’ll assume.

    Acadenic “Z’ says: Are the white, black, asian, etc. groups of daters identical *except* for their race, so that we really can be confident that race itself is the causal factor? There is no evidence that this is the case.

  38. Robert Singh says:

    I don’t know if you folks had a stiff drink for breakfast today, but in my experience, American white women are among the most racist women in the world.

    I was born to Indian immigrants, just south of London. I am a Sikh, and wear a turban. I am 193 cm tall.

    I went to school, made the usual teenager mistakes, got back on track, got a Ph. D. from Cambridge in microbiology, before wading across to pond to pursue a postdoc at Harvard. I hope to complete around Thanksgiving. I am counting the minutes until I can get back home.

    In the UK, I dated women of nearly every race. White, Caribbean, South Asian, Chinese, East European, etc. Sometimes a few women would turn me down because of my race, but never because of my religion. These cases were few and far between.

    Here in Cambridge, Massachusetts, supposedly the most open and liberal city in America, I have had very few dates. White women always turn me down, though they are amused by my put-on cockney accent. My only three dates have been – 1. Black, 2. Chinese-American, 3. Australian. I mention the last to emphasise that these attitudes have little to do with white women in general, but concern white American women in particular. Even Indian girls do not give me the time of the day. What is wrong with you American women ?

    I am 34, fairly well to do, practically have a job offer in hand, tall and am funny.

    One of my former colleagues, who is a white girl from Philadelphia, told me a few months ago that she wished I was white and Christian. The audacity of it !

    Next August, I start my teaching position at Sheffield. You can keep your racist country to yourself.

  39. anthracite says:

    fenchurch :
    I suppose it isn’t a bad idea to introduce MTF and FTM categories. More information, why not ?
    I do hope that you won’t mind that i will systematically refuse to answer *any* email from a mtf person ?
    I will of course engage in conversation about various topics with such a person. On fbook, for instance, i have chatted about various scientific issues with people who self identify as mtf . I also have read the works of some well known mtf economists and other academics.
    But i will under no circumstance respond to any kind of romantic or sexual offer coming from a mtf personm, no matter what their looks or interests.

  40. PausingLeming says:

    you guys,
    I love the way you analyze the human spirit by the multitude of profiles here,
    this is truely great, keep it up!

    Now, enough ppl gave you their piece of mind about your conclusions,
    mixing racial preference with racism, so I won’t repeat, just agree with my peers.

    However, as a man of science myself, I found your most interesting research halting right before another insight.
    Don’t you find it odd that the males that are most to be replied back (whites) are the least to reply back, and the women who are the least to replied back (blacks) are the most to reply?

    My suggestion to you guys is to break reply history into time segments and try to correlate the reply rate of people by the replied-back rate of the prior time period. you might find a nice correlation there..

    It is a seemingly obvious correlation that says something on us people, regardless to skin color (and maybe that’s why you didn’t include it, it might have not play along with your racism dogma): The more popular you are, the snobbier you get.
    Now isn’t that a conclusion worth assessing and publishing?

  41. JasonP says:

    All races have committed savage acts, White people just have the technology to perform it on a global scale; where-as in Africa it was limited locally because of a lack of technology (no wheel, no written language, etc).

    People want to stick with their own. This is normal, the fact that people are brainwashed to believe it isn’t is ridiculous and I’m sick of hearing about it. I don’t like diversity and I like being with my own people. So what?

    This article is ridiculous, why not do response rate based on if you are bald or short, etc? Is that just as ‘evil’?

  42. Paige_Six says:

    I’m preferably looking for and asian or pacific islander male, if anyones interested hit me up ;)

  43. SWF says:

    Others have mentioned it, but I too would like to see if there is a correlation between race and propensity to use those phrases that are negatively associated with response rate, such as commenting on one’s appearance.

    As a white female who so far primarily responds to white males, I delete anyone who doesn’t fit my filters (married and outside a 10-year wide age range), and who comments only on my appearance. While some white guys fall into this category (and I delete them too), so far only white guys have passed my initial filtering process.

    Is that my fault that anecdotally other races have a more difficult time communicating with women?

  44. Meg says:

    @Melanie

    Women get hot and bothered over income? Really? I must need to check my calendar, ’cause I thought this was 2009, not 1959. By the way, if we extrapolate from your logic, black men are the worst mates: the same studies that show Asian men having higher IQs, bigger incomes, higher obesity rates, and smaller criminal records show the exact opposite for black men. So yeah, trying to combat racism with race- and gender-based stereotypes is probably not such a hot idea. I agree that better media representation would help, though. I’m a white woman, and my first Asian crush was Jackie Chan. I think it’s a shame that Kal Penn decided to change career tracks, in a way, because it seemed like a lot of women were just going crazy for him.

    @KT Chong,

    Did you actually read the charts, or just glance at the pretty colors and read OKCupid’s interpretation of the charts? White women respond at a rate of 21%-29%, depending on race, while white men respond at 32%-47%. In other words, white men will respond to 15 less messages given a set of 100 from their least-preferred race that they would from their preferred race, while white women will reply to 8 less. That’s a “race preference” gap nearly twice as big — so much for even-handedness! BTW, white women are replied to less than women of all races except for black women. I guess the menfolk are competing so hard for white women’s attention that they forget to talk to us.

  45. Jennifer says:

    Thank you! People need to see the ugly truth. Racism is live and well as so long as we are all turning the other cheek. I mean it is right here, behind our closed doors. Thank you OkCupid!

  46. TheVoiceOfReason says:

    Blacks have the most diverse DNA so if we want to preach eugenics here then black women would be the most desired because they can carry on the human race better. Thats not the case. People in this society are taught that white is right.

  47. TheVoiceOfReason says:

    @ Gucci Mang

    The marriage rate among blacks is horrible that is why interracial dating is becoming popular. Don’t act like blacks have it all peachy keen neither do whites. Blacks really don’t get a chance because of stigma. alot of people did NOT read the article above correctly. OK cupid said that there should be equal responses. I guess when racism benefits you; you can deny it all you want and justify it. This blog is the legacy of racism that still goes on.

  48. Xhokky says:

    I am going to have to play devil’s advocate to relieve the pressure on white guys (though only just a little): Asian girls probably had their first relationships with Asian guys, broke up, got sick of the way Asian guys are like in GENERAL, and settled for somebody that’s far easier to deal with, physically and intellectually – yes this is a direct insult to you, my typical white bloke friend. I really can’t vouch for myself because I don’t date Asian girls, I just observe my Asian friends and family, they don’t really know how to treat a girl well… and never bother to learn.

    As an Asian guy, who really has no problems with any girl of any race, I’m giving kudos to all of you black women in this discussion. If there were more of you that stood out with effective arguments and just reason, the times would turn around for you gals. It is really sad that my friends have personally said that they find ONLY black women unattractive… I’ve always wanted to defend because I wholeheartedly disagree. In the end, it was useless because we were raised in a society where the that god awful “definition” of beauty brainwashed us.
    Anyways, a cute and smart chocolate floats my boat, I would definitely go out with a sister. :)

  49. Hana says:

    Another small trend I saw was a low response rate of Indian men to Pacific Islander women. Could this be a throwback from the indentured labour Colonial Britain imposed upon the Fijian Islands? There is a colourful history there which continues to this day about the racial roles in Fiji.

  50. Jessie Maims says:

    Speculator: “In the US, white men tend to be more financially successful than others (largely due to having more opportunities). Might this be at least part of the reason women of all ethnicities are favoring white men? Not because of how they look, but for what they can provide?”

    In the US, Indian and Asian men tend to be better off than or equal to white men in that regard, so…
    I also disagree vehemently with your premise, but arguments about the validity of evpsych when applied to modern human gender roles would be a derail. Speaking of which, I’d like to thank everyone who kept themselves from getting sucked into the oh-so-inviting AA argument vortex that was forming at one point. :)

    Richard: Oh, I had an intellectual understanding of why the phenomenon occurs, but for me it creates a “don’t believe your lying eyes” type of cognitive dissonance when groups of men that seem perfectly fine to me are rejected wholesale — I was saying that I don’t grok it.

    anthracite: “The non-black males don’t yet realise that the black females on this site are not the ones they’re used to seeing on tv or even in real life.”

    See, if this were true, the reply rates would be more average for black female senders combined with a low rate of first messages to black females (which can only be assumed at this point, but is extremely likely based on everything else that we know) unless black female senders are somehow predisposed to being more stereotypical than other black women on OKC. But more stereotypical black women, like you say… generally don’t want all that much to do with white guys and “model minorities” romantically, let alone enough to initiate contact. If non-black guys were all about avoiding the stereotypical behavior of black women as opposed to the appearance of black women, and OKC black females aren’t very stereotypical in behavior, first messages from them would be a game-changer, but black women here have a dismally low first message response rate for their gender, and I really doubt it’s because they’re sending messages to Asian dudes* that say “U luk gud boi, lemme hit dat” en masse.

    *their lowest responders