How to Find Mr/Miss Right? The Mechanism of Search Among Online Daters in Shanghai

Abstract

Although online dating tools have become increasingly diverse over the decades, little is known about the search strategies of individuals or their choices of using certain dating platforms. Based on interviews with 29 heterosexual, highly-educated daters conducted in Shanghai, we examine their strategies for finding a partner online. Online daters can be categorized into three distinct dating types depending on their mating goals and mate preferences: dating, xiangqin (matchmaking), and mixed. We investigated the underlying gendered factors that drove them to specific dating types and guided their choices of online dating platforms. Despite the heterogeneity in dating types, online dating exhibited homophily effects, which may reinforce social inequality in China’s marriage market. While existing research often contrasted online dating with “traditional venues” and used online dating to symbolize modernity, we illustrate the subtlety between xiangqin and dating, thereby challenging the widely-used dichotomy of traditionality and modernity in conceptualizing family-related behaviors.