ABSTRACT. This research investigates the relationship between online romance, impression management, and sexual behaviors. Building my argument by drawing on data collected from B2B International, Kaspersky Lab, Pew Research Center, Statista, and Verto Analytics, I performed analyses and made estimates regarding reasons for online dating (%), users’ concerns while they are dating online (%), U.S. adults who personally know someone who has used an online dating site or application (%), most popular online dating applications in the U.S. by audience size (in millions), and U.S. adults who have used a dating website or app (%, by age group and gender). The data for this research were gathered via an online survey questionnaire and were analyzed through structural equation modeling on a sample of 5,600 respondents.

Keywords: social attraction; mobile dating application; impression management

How to cite: Flygare, Anne (2019). “Gaining Social Attraction and Disrupting Gender Dynamics through Mobile Dating Applications: Online Romance, Impression Management, and Sexual Behaviors,” Journal of Research in Gender Studies 9(1): 167–173. doi:10.22381/JRGS91201910

Received 7 March 2019 • Received in revised form 8 July 2019
Accepted 9 July 2019 • Available online 10 July 2019