Guest Thinkers — February 12, 2011

Does Online Dating Work?

Online dating sites provide a marketplace to easily shop around and find interesting people to meet, but building lasting relationships requires more offline maintenance.

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The Internet has become one of the most popular places for people to meet, according to the 2010 large-scale survey How Couples Meet and Stay Together. “(Online dating) definitely works,” said Reuben J. Thomas, an assistant professor of sociology at the City University of New York, who collaborated on the survey. “We estimate that 23 percent of the couples in the U.S. who met in the two years from 2007 to 2009 met online. More people meet online now than meet through school, work, church, bars, parties, et cetera.”

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Technology & Innovation

Why Online Dating Sites Don’t Work

A pair of social psychologists say the things that make a relationship work—what you learn about someone after you’ve met them—cannot possibly be measured by online dating sites.

Guest Thinkers

Public Opinion and Political Participation in the Climate Change Debate

Public opinion about climate change, observes the New York Times’ Andrew Revkin, can be compared to “waves in a shallow pan,” easily tipped with “a lot of sloshing but not […]

Surprising Science

Looking for Love on Facebook

The majority of people who met their current partner online did not find love through dating sites, but chat rooms (24%), social networking sites (14%), bulletin boards (8%) and a variety of different sites.

Guest Thinkers

Why You Should Pay for Online Dating

If you manage to find a match through an online dating site, that match is more likely to commit to meet if they have paid a fee for the service.

Guest Thinkers

AU Students Debate the Internet’s Impact on Society, Part A

This fall in the sophomore-level course I teach on “Communication and Society,” we spent several weeks examining the many ways that individuals and groups are using the internet to alter […]

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Surprising Science

Chocolate Better Than Fruit Juice

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