Dating in the Digital Age : A Research Experiment
tional time spent on other things such as messaging matches .
• These 6 swiping hours make up roughly 0.7 % of my total time in a 35-day period .
• And using only 0.7 % of my time , I managed to swipe through an estimated 21,000 profiles of individuals living within less than 5 miles of my Upper East Side apartment .
• Once again , that number is 21,000 . Not 2,100 . Not 210 . Not 21 . Twenty-One Thousand .
• I understand how the 21,000 may appear unbelievable . Although it is an estimate , it is a realistic number nonetheless . Below is an explanation on how I arrived at that figure :
• I conducted various 60-second drills to see how fast I could swipe through profiles , while still being able to “ judge ” them . Sometimes I could swipe through as many as 75 profiles per minute , other times as little as 48 . But , the average number of profiles swiped in a 60-second period was 58.5 .
• By swiping an average of 58.5 profiles per minute , one can easily swipe through around 3,500 profiles an hour . At least initially , Tinder can be addicting ; thus , spending hours glued to your phone swiping right or left is completely feasible .
• Of the 21,000 swipes , I swiped right ( i . e . “ liked ”) on approximately 500 profiles�meaning that I rejected 97.6 % of all profiles encountered . However , of those 500 profiles , about 150 of them were right-
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