Singleness and the Pandemic Dating Recession

Abstract

The Coronavirus pandemic in the US represented a fundamental challenge to casual dating and to romantic relationship formation. The How Couples Meet and Stay Together (HCMST) data for 2017–2022 show that the rate of singleness among US adults rose from 18.9% in 2017 to 24.3% in 2022 (or higher after adjusting for age), implying that more than 10 million more US adults were single during the pandemic in 2022 compared to 2017. HCMST data show that the difficulty in forming new relationships during the pandemic seems to explain most of the rise in pandemic singleness. Young adults were especially affected by the pandemic dating recession. The arrival of COVID-19 vaccines did not ameliorate the pandemic dating recession; on the contrary, vaccinated adults were more likely to describe barriers to dating in 2022. The rise in singlehood during the pandemic has been under-appreciated because our official data sources focus primarily on marriage and cohabitation, leaving casual and informal romantic relationships understudied. The lack of data on casual romantic relationships in the US has led to a lack of appreciation for the potential vulnerability of casual relationships to external shocks such as a pandemic.