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Pre-Dating's "Speed Dating" Survey Reveals Women Tend To Like Younger Men & 70% of Participants Match

6/2/2004

Pre-Dating's "Speed Dating" Survey Reveals Women Tend To Like Younger Men & 70% of Participants Match
Time Crunched Singles Rate Their Speed Dating Experiences in Pre-Dating.com Event Survey
Women "say" they want to meet men who are older, but after the bell rings and the votes are counted, they are twice as likely to circle yes to younger, rather than older men. Nearly 70% of people attending "matched" and over 90% found someone they were interested in getting to know better.
A sign of today's fast-food, time-starved culture, "speed dating" has become the fastest growing dating trend today, where singles meet one another in a series of short mini-dates and has taken the country by storm.
500 participants were surveyed in 25 cities across the country about "speed dating" and was conducted by Pre-Dating Events (pre-dating.com), one of the largest "speed dating" companies in the US and the only national company focusing solely on busy single professionals, reveals many interesting facts about how people make quick judgments about potential mates. The study also reveals some surprising results about what singles consider to be most important in finding a partner and notes the differences between genders in how they approach a situation, where they only have a few minutes to make that all-important first impression.
HOW PRE-DATING SPEED DATING WORKS
Singles meet face-to-face and converse for 6-minutes before a bell rings and the men rotate to the next table. In-between, everyone marks on their match sheet their preference for the person they just met, either circling yes to express interest in exchanging contact information or circling no so that no contact information is exchanged. "Matches" are made when two people circle yes for one another. Participants receive an email message the next day with the contact information of the people they matched with.
FORMAT EFFECTIVENESS
Ultimately, the effectiveness of speed dating can be measured by how much activity occurs after the event. Although the study revealed that about half of the people attending an event decided to do so to try something different and figured it would be a fun night out, while the other half went primarily to find someone to build a relationship with. After the event, 65% said it was "better than they thought it was going to be", with 95% saying they would or may try it again.
After a match is made, participants receive each other's contact information in email and approximately 75% of those with a match actually get in contact with one another. Of these, about 70% agree to go on a date or meet again in another social setting. Even though both participants are encouraged to make initial contact, men are more likely to make the initial contact, as only 25% of women email or call first. Although there are many success stories of people who have developed long term relationships as a result of Pre-Dating events, it's difficult to present an accurate figure because many successes are not reported.
The study found that men seem to look at dating as more of a "numbers game" and are more willing to attend repeatedly. Of those who tried the service more than once, men were slightly more likely than women to do so for up to 3 times. While 98% of women who tried the service will stop after 3 events, men will return 4, 5 or more times with some having attended 8 or more events. Of the men who have attended more than 4 times, 80% have had positive results getting matches and making follow-up dates, but these didn't result in a lasting match. Apparently, they believe in the format and feel it's just a matter of time before they meet their ultimate match so they continue to attend.
OCCUPATIONS
The top occupations for women who attended Pre-Dating events were attorneys (due to their busy schedule) and teachers (female dominated profession, not in contact with many eligible men). The most common occupations for men who attended Pre-Dating's events were Business Owners (schedule) and various Engineering Professions (male dominated, fewer eligible women in workplace).
SELECTIVITY
Pre-Dating's study also looked at the two extremes of selectivity, those who were very discerning and those who were very liberal when it came to the number of people they circled yes to. Of those people who did not circle anyone (the most discerning), women were 4 times more likely to circle "no" to everyone than men were. Of those who circled yes to 70% or more of the people there (the most liberal), men were the most liberal in their selections. That is, men were 4 times more likely to circle yes to 70% or more of the people they met than women were.
AGE PREFERENCES
Surprisingly, contrary to what most people might think about women's age preferences for a partner, men at the younger end of an event's target age group (10 year span) tended to receive 53% more "yeses" than men at the top of the age range. Therefore, twice as many women actually preferred men their age and younger rather than men who were older.
Pre-Dating holds unique "special interest" events to further increase the odds of people connecting, such as athletic/active lifestyle, tall men/tall women and others. One of these is called "Younger Men/Older Women" where men are in their late 20's to 30's and women are in their late 30's to mid-40's. This particular event has the highest success rate of any of the special interest events, with average match rates exceeding 90%.
BEHAVIOR
Men were slightly more likely to change a yes/no selection than women, with 8% of men wanting to make a change on their Match Sheet at the event or within one day of the event (where they call or email that they wanted a selection to be changed) while 5% of women ask to make a change. However, 80% of the men who requested a change in their selection changed a "no" to a "yes", while 65% of women did the opposite, changing a "yes" to a "no".
While at the event, each participant provides an email address to be forwarded to his or her matches, with a phone number being optional. For people under 40 years old, men are about 30% more likely to provide a phone number than women, but for those over 40, men and women are equally likely to provide a phone number in addition to their email address.
LIKEABILITY CHARACTERISTICS
Participants were surveyed afterwards to see what factors would or did influence their decision to circle yes or no for someone. A total of 10 characteristics were provided where they ranked each of them in order of importance. These results shed light on what characteristics people look for in a partner and how people make relatively quick decisions when going on a 6-minute "pre-date" rather than a full-length date. As one might guess, there were some differences between what issues were more or less important to each gender:
When it came to whether to circle yes or no, women found both the quality of the conversation and the man's overall attitude to be most important with intelligence a close 3rd and a sense of humor as the 4th most important factor. Least important was the distance away someone lived from them (so long as it was not more than an hour's travel time), and perhaps surprisingly, what a man did for a living was the 2nd least important factor.
Not surprising however, men found a woman's physical appearance to be highest on their list, but appearance was equally as important as "chemistry" to them. Men and women felt similarly that how far they lived away from one another and what someone does for a living were least important.
Men and women felt similarly for the rest of the criteria such as how much the person seemed to be interested in them; how a potential match was dressed; whether the other person made eye contact or not and if they had similar interests.
COMPARED TO OTHER DATING FORMATS
Pre-Dating also surveyed participants on other methods used to find that special someone. Results showed that 60% of the busy professionals that responded have tried other methods, including online dating and/or dating services, but most preferred the face-to-face conversational aspect of the speed-date format to other methods.
"I believe that the speed-date format is here to stay and will become a significant and widely accepted way for singles to meet, date and form lasting relationships. Even though 6 minutes seems brief, this study shows it's long enough to form certain opinions about someone and people are clearly finding matches, are returning and feel it's a viable way to meet people in an efficient, yet dignified way" said Cara Gluskoter, a Sociology Professor at a South Florida College who reviewed the results of the study.