If you’ve been on dating apps before, you’ve probably taken part in ‘carouselling’ without even realising it.
However, there’s something you should know before you continue, as an expert has warned about the dangers of the dating trend.
What is ‘carouselling’?
For those of you who are unaware, carouselling is essentially when you chat to numerous matches across different apps but only engage in surface-level talks.
So, you never really get to know one person.
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Instead of deciding that you like someone enough to take the leap and book in an in-person meeting, instead, you carry on talking via the apps until you get bored and then move on to the next person.
I mean, it’s easily done so don’t feel bad if you’re chatting to match numbers three, seven and 13 right now and have no plans to make it serious with any of them.
But it doesn’t mean that you should continue doing so.
After all, there’s a person on the other end of that phone and they might be really into you.
What do experts say about carouselling?
It can also spark trouble for your own mind, according to Elias Aboujaoude, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Stanford University.
He told National Geographic that dating app matches can give users a ‘rush’ of dopamine which can lead to becoming ‘addicted’ to these sites.
“We know that dopamine is involved in many, many addictive processes, and there’s some data to suggest that it’s involved in our addiction to the screen,” Aboujaoude added.
This addiction to dating apps can lead a person to start carouselling, or talking to matches without developing anything further.It’s basically like a dopamine boost from new conversations.
Or, maybe the person is subconsciously afraid of meeting up in person in case they don’t live up to the expectations of their match.
Now, that’s a scary thought - but it’s also not unrealistic to be afraid of this happening.
According to the Mirror, research from dating app Finding The One found that 77 percent of people dating feel more anxious the longer the conversations go on for before meeting up in real life for the first time.
Sylvia Linzalone, the app's dating expert, explained that prolonged messaging was creating an ‘anxiety trap’ that’s making dating harder for people in the modern world.
She said: "The longer they stay on the messaging carousel, the more daunting the idea of the meeting becomes, and it's fuelling unnecessary anxiety.
“Meeting sooner means less pressure and less anxiety. It lets you see if there's a real connection in the real world, where it actually matters."
Finding The One’s study found that 83 percent out of the 1,500 respondents admitted they prefer to meet in person within a week of matching, but also ‘feel pressured to continue messaging’.
However, it went on to find that many daters are hesitant to suggest meeting up too quickly, as they don’t want to come off as ‘too eager’ or ‘pushy’.
There’s surely got to be a middle ground between carouselling and meeting too early out of fear that the conversation will drag on too long.
Perhaps there should be an app for that?
Topics: Sex and Relationships, Dating trends
Britt Jones