Swipe Right Or Left; The Connection Between Online Dating & Your Mental Health

The Problem With Lying

So more than likely this isn’t new information to you: not surprisingly, individuals lie on their profiles and with their pictures to appear more of a catch than they truly are. A published study from OpinionMatters of over 1,000 online daters in the U.S. and the U.K. determined a total of fifty-three percent of American participants admitted they lied on their online dating profile, with women apparently lying more often than men, especially when it comes to appearance and profile pictures. Over twenty percent of women posted photos depicting their younger selves, whereas over forty percent of men lied about their financial situation and having a better job than they actually do, whereas a third of women did it too.

Other significant problems that many online daters can run into is being ‘catfished,’ or ‘ghosted.’ Catfished is when an individual makes a connection online with another person, but the person on the other end is deceiving them and are not who they say they are and usually look nothing like their online pictures. Being ghosted is when a dater begins seeing someone, who then out of the blue completely stops all communication and disappears out of their life with no explanation. These two distinct forms of lying and deception can greatly hurt a person’s self-worth, and make them question what is wrong with them as well as make them feel unintelligent. All of which can spiral into other mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety.

Next, find out how having too many choices can cause anxiety and stress for online daters.