What is 'a message that enhances likability from your opponent'? Sociologists analyze dating sites

People who do not have opportunities to meet heterosexuality in the workplace or daily life are increasingly searching for marriage partners and lovers using dating sites such as online dating service. However, even if an attractive opponent finds it, it is troubling what kind of message should be sent to a person who has never talked. Elizabeth · Bruch who is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Michigan said that he analyzed the message actually exchanged at the dating site, and he explained the reason why the probability that the reply will be raised if sending the message doing.

Aspirational pursuit of mates in online dating markets | Science Advances
http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaap 9815

The messages that get replied on online sites, according to sociologists - Quartz
https://qz.com/1352894/sociologists-analyzed-messages-sent-by-online-daters-to-find-which-flirting-techniques-work-the-best/

Out of your league? Study shows online daters message more desirable people | Life and style | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/aug/08/out-of-your-league-online-daters-try-to-punch-above-their-weight

Mr. Bruff analyzed the message of about 187,000 users living in four cities in New York, Boston, Chicago, Seattle, USA that are registered for a certain dating service. People with a lot of messages received from opposite sexes are positioned as "attractive people", and users are ranked according to the frequency of receiving messages.

Then, it became obvious that most users send messages to users of the same level as their rank, but users with an average of 25% (men: 26%, females: 23%) are higher than their own ranks It turned out that there was a tendency to send a message to people of higher rank.

Also, it was found out that there is a gender difference in the content of the message for the upper-ranking user. When sending a message to an over-rated woman, a man sent "a short message without special consideration", but when a female user sends a message to an over-rated male, "a message longer than usual" It is clear that there is a tendency to send.

At this time, the wording used in the message also has features, and men tend to "become content dry as the opponent's rating goes up", but women aggressively approach " It is also found that there is a tendency to use a lot of words ".

As a result of examining the average response rate to the message of the survey target user, 37% of female users who respond to male messages, 16% male users who respond to female messages, and 2 It turned out that a difference of twice occurred.

Research shows changes in response rate to message contents. If you frequently use "actively approaching words" in the message, both men and women tend to lower the response rate. In addition, it became clear that about "long message" is lowering the evaluation from men in the three cities excluding Seattle.

The tendency of the message contents of male's "shorter" sent to a higher-ranking opponent and "the content becomes dry as the rating becomes higher" and the tendency of women's "long sentence" "to use actively approaching words" tendency The effect of this is shown in the response rate. The response rate of the former is 21% which is much lower than the average of 37%, and it is clear that the response rate to the latter is lower than the average value of 16%. In addition, when sending a message to a higher ranking opponent, the larger the rank difference is, the more the response rate tends to decrease. It is conceivable from this result that when sending a message to heterosexuality avoid long sentences as much as possible and refrain from using words that suggest a positive approach.

Mr. Bernie Hogan, who is conducting research on dating sites at Oxford University, says "This trend is more likely to apply in other countries," he says, "Different relationships demanded by people It does not necessarily apply to everyone, "he says.

In addition, at the timing of Mr. Bruff's investigation, 30-year-old female user living in New York received the message most. This user received 1504 messages during the investigation period, once a half hour every 30 minutes. Mr. Bruff said, "This user is the most popular of the dating service we surveyed and no one was following her," said the frequency with which this user sends messages Since it is about 2 or 3 cases per month, even if an ordinary man sends a message to her, it explains that the possibility of being opponent is very low.