Swipe Away Your Mental Health An Analysis of the Effect of Online Dating Design on User Mental Health and Overall Well-Being

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Description
Online dating continues to be one of the most common ways people meet one another. Only in the last couple of years has information begun to show how these online sites and applications negatively affect their users. This study examines

Online dating continues to be one of the most common ways people meet one another. Only in the last couple of years has information begun to show how these online sites and applications negatively affect their users. This study examines how the User Interface and User Experience (UI/UX) design of the dating app Tinder influences its users and its impact on their mental health and overall well-being. An online survey of 74 Tinder users between the ages of 18 and 35 was conducted, coded, and analyzed. The results of this study corroborate with previous research and claims that different User Interface and User Experience (UI/UX) elements within Tinder do impact and influence their users. The results also substantiate the research and claims that online dating and dating apps do impact their users in a predominantly negative manner. Overall, this study found that while dating apps can lend themselves to helping people find someone, they have the power to influence and negatively impact their users’ beliefs, mental health, and overall well-being.
Date Created
2024
Agent

Ask Me No Questions, I’ll Tell You No Lies: Face and Privacy Management Implications in Addiction-Related Disclosures

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Description
For most people, sexual activity is a normal and healthy part of intimate romantic relationships. However, for some, sexual behaviors can become problematic to the extent their behaviors begin to impair or disrupt critical aspects of effective functioning. The inability

For most people, sexual activity is a normal and healthy part of intimate romantic relationships. However, for some, sexual behaviors can become problematic to the extent their behaviors begin to impair or disrupt critical aspects of effective functioning. The inability to control problematic sexual behavior is among the most prominent traits for diagnosing compulsive sexual behavior or what is commonly referred to as sex addiction. Sex addicts in committed romantic relationships routinely engage in secrecy and deception as a maladaptive means to cope with the shame and guilt associated with such severe relational transgressions. Although ongoing disclosures with one’s dyadic partner regarding addiction-related struggles may be a healthy exercise in transparency and accountability, such honest disclosures risk re-injuring the transgressed partner while simultaneously upending the recovering addict’s attempt to restore face. Hence, recovering sex addicts who wish to repair their blighted dyadic relationships must carefully navigate self-disclosure and privacy implications as they attempt to restore themselves and their intimate relationships. Accordingly, this dissertation utilizes thematic analysis to explore the face and privacy implications surrounding addiction-related disclosures (ARD) in committed dyadic relationships. This qualitative study conducted semi-structured interviews with 14 recovering sex addicts attending 12-step Sex Addicts Anonymous groups. Key findings from this study suggest a relationship between recovery progress and how ARD are comprised, articulated, and interpreted by dyadic partners. Additionally, this study found that ARD, although damaging, largely did not result in relationship termination. Rather, relationships impacted by such disclosures simultaneously experienced two disparate relationship stages of bonding and stagnating. Finally, this study suggests that the reverberation of salacious ARD across the romantic dyad fundamentally upends the transgressor’s positive face. Such severe face damage was found to attenuate participants’ ability to regulate privacy boundaries with their partners.
Date Created
2023
Agent

The Effects of Digital Technologies on the Body Esteem of College-Aged Women

Description

Dating apps have become commonplace in our society, with popular apps such as Tinder having more than 75 million monthly active users. Dating apps allow people to search for relationships, serious or casual, at any time of the day and

Dating apps have become commonplace in our society, with popular apps such as Tinder having more than 75 million monthly active users. Dating apps allow people to search for relationships, serious or casual, at any time of the day and greatly expands a person’s dating network. However, dating apps mostly rely on photographs of their users in order for potential matches to choose to pursue a relationship. So, users are tasked with promoting an appealing online version of themselves to their audience. This research seeks to understand how dating apps affect body esteem, specifically how dating app usage and photo editing correlate to reported body esteem. The findings of this study indicate that the amount of dating apps a person uses correlates to negative body esteem, and that those that reported editing their photographs more than their peers also reported lower body esteem.

Date Created
2023-05
Agent