The introduction of mobile phone dating apps led to a significant increase in sexual activity among college students, but there was no corresponding increase in committed relationships. Although these platforms coincided with increases in reports of sexual assault and sexually transmitted diseases, they surprisingly did not worsen average mental health and even produced small psychological improvements for some women. The findings are published in a large study published in the American Economic Journal Applied Economics.
Currently, online matchmaking is the most common way for heterosexual adult couples in the United States to form relationships. Before 2013, the idea of digital matchmaking belonged to a niche industry with primarily desktop websites. Mobile applications with location tracking and instant notifications have completely transformed industry standards.
Following the mainstream expansion of mobile dating platforms in the early 2010s, these applications were often accused in the public press of promoting casual romance. Commentators also speculated that digital matchmaking distorts the fairness of the dating market and harms young people’s mental health. Economists Berkeren Büyükeren, Alexey Makarin, and Heyu Xiong wanted to measure exactly what behavioral changes occurred when these technologies first appeared on the university market.
Economic theory provides a framework for understanding how digital matching tools change dating habits. Meeting people in person requires time, effort, and social navigation, which creates friction and slows down relationship building. Mobile phone applications theoretically allow individuals to experiment more broadly by reducing search costs and eliminating the fear of unrewarding rejection. The researchers hypothesized that if matching became easier, the amount of casual dating would increase, but people would spend more time looking for a permanent partner.
Simple lay observations don’t prove that apps change human behavior, so the researchers looked for historical features that isolate the technology’s impact. They looked to Tinder’s early marketing strategy. When the company launched its trademark swipe interface in 2013, management intentionally targeted universities. They focused their initial efforts on socially influential fraternities and sororities.
The success of this platform relied on network effects. An application based on finding local singles only works if thousands of local singles have it installed on their mobile phones. To ensure a dense network of early adopters, the company sent brand ambassadors directly to campus housing organizations to get people to sign up. The company also subsidized off-campus parties where the only admission fee was to download an app.
To corroborate this historical narrative, researchers analyzed more than 700,000 articles from university newspapers published between 2013 and 2016. Campuses with active Greek populations published significantly more articles on the platform than campuses with less active Greek populations. The study authors also examined national search engine trends and found that search strength for the application rose the most in towns with universities with known fraternity networks.
Thanks to this aggressive campaign, fraternity and sorority students adopted applications much earlier and in far greater numbers than other students. Researchers tested this early adopter trend by analyzing anonymous cell phone location data that pinpointed specific university ZIP codes. They demonstrated that areas with dense fraternity networks maintained much higher daily application usage rates than areas without networks. The researchers then used this targeted rollout as a natural experiment, comparing the habits of affiliated students to unaffiliated students before and after the summer of 2013.
To see how students’ habits have changed, the team analyzed responses from the National University Health Assessment. The American College Health Association distributes this survey to hundreds of colleges each semester to collect data on young people’s physical and psychological well-being. This large research sample included 1.1 million full-time undergraduate students surveyed between 2008 and 2019.
Büyükeren and colleagues found that the app caused a significant increase in sexual behavior. Since 2013, fraternity and sorority members reported a significant increase in the average number of sexual partners compared to unaffiliated students. Students who belonged to a fraternity or sorority were also several percentage points more likely to report having had sex in the past month.
Despite this increase in casual encounters, the application did not lead to more long-term romantic relationships. Researchers found no change in the proportion of students living with a partner or in a stable romantic relationship. Survey responses also showed no significant change in whether students experienced relationship difficulties.
This technology has also changed the distribution of successful daters, creating a superstar effect in which a small number of people command a large share of the dating market. The researchers noted that the distribution of sexual encounters was shifting outwards, meaning that the most active top-tier users were scoring a disproportionately large proportion of the total matches. This dating inequality was particularly pronounced among male users, meaning that an exclusive group of men secured large profits, while other users got nothing.
Increased sexual activity has also brought increased physical risks and safety concerns. Data on non-consensual encounters reflects the rise in casual dating. After the application was introduced, sexual assault reports jumped by 2 percentage points. The baseline rate of sexual assault in the larger study was about 9 percent, so a 2 percentage point increase would represent a sizable increase in overall incidents on campus.
As the incidence of bacterial infections such as chlamydia has increased, testing for human immunodeficiency virus has also increased by more than 1 percentage point. Researchers noted that this surge in testing may reflect proactive health measures by students who are aware of their increased risk of exposure. Rather than simply indicating the true spread of the virus, the testing numbers suggest that users are aware of the dangers of casual romance.
Despite widespread social anxiety about social media and depression, the introduction of swipe-based applications did not worsen average mental health scores. Instead, the researchers documented a slight improvement in psychological well-being among fraternity and sorority members compared to other members. This positive change was highly significant among female students across several markers of clinical distress, including reductions in severe depression and reported instances of intentional self-harm.
The data also showed a relative decline in the prevalence of eating disorders among women after the introduction of the app. The study authors suspect that digital dating platforms provided a psychological high that offset the normal stressors of undergraduate life. Constant romantic attention and receiving dozens of digital matches daily may have served as a temporary confidence boost that improved overall body image.
Because this study is based on self-reported survey responses, there is always a risk of response bias. Still, the survey was anonymous, which helps reduce the incentive for students to lie about their romantic experiences or medical history. The researchers also noted that people who artificially exaggerate their sexual success were less likely to fabricate stories of sexual assault or illness at the same time.
Another limitation involves the existence of social amalgamation on the university’s shared campus. Students outside of fraternities and sororities continued to interact with affiliated students and download the application, despite lower initial rates. When researchers accounted for these broader campus usage rates in alternative models, the central trends in sexual activity remained stable.
Future research could investigate precise behavioral data from individual user profiles rather than relying on broader campus membership categories. Additional research could also examine how dating applications change older adults’ romantic paths outside of the isolated university environment.
The dating market serves as a precursor to the marriage market. Understanding how digital tools affect initial romantic relationships can help economists predict long-term demographic changes. While popular culture often blames technology for modern relationship struggles, this study shows that dating apps are successfully delivering on their original design promise by maximizing short-term romantic connections.
The study, “The Impact of Dating Apps on Young People: Evidence from Tinder,” was authored by Berkeren Büyükeren, Alexey Makarin, and Heyu Xiong.
