The Covid-19 coronavirus imposes confinement in France. Difficult to meet when you are single when you are forced to stay at home. But not impossible! Between virtual meetings and long discussions, users of dating sites such as Tinder or Happn change their dating habits.
Is it possible to find love in the coronavirus era? In order to stem the spread of the coronavirus, the French are forced to stay at home. And if some are wondering how to survive confinement as a couple, single people must adapt to these measures on the dating apps. What to do when meeting in real life is impossible?
Containment benefits long discussions
What if this particular context was ultimately the best time to go to online dating? This is what Judith Duportail, author of Love under algorithm. "We will have to take our time! There is no longer any question of meeting after 2 messages, getting carried away at the end of the 1st pint and judging whether the other deserves a real place in our life in a few hours" she writes on Twitter. People looking for an evening relationship are likely to get bored quickly and therefore desert dating apps. However, the most sensitive and those looking for a lasting relationship will review their approach. A bad for a good ?
"It seems to me that this can be an opportunity to wait before the 1st meeting to take the time to discover and get to know it. Get out of the" date "frenzy, slow down, as much in the transition to meet IRL (note: "in real life", in real life) very soon after the first discussions, only in the verdict on the meeting. To be less in a hurry than usual to categorize the other or the encounter ("it's a dead end", "it's an emotional addict", "she's too narcissistic", etc.) or say "next "A little quickly before moving on to another" adds Cécile Guéret, psychotherapist and author of To love is to take the risk of surprise.
This trend is confirmed since the Happn dating application reveals that 43% of its users have, since the strict confinement measures, changed their habits of dating. And 70% would admit that they now favor prolonged discussions and the discovery of the other over the long term.
Happn also adapts to confinement since the very principle of the application is to "find who you meet". It has thus extended its crossing radius, initially 250 m around the user, up to 90 km, in order to preserve social ties and allow new e-datingdespite the confinement.
The app has also published a list of tips and discussion ideas for "dating" at home: "cooking together", "sharing your favorite movies / series / music" or "using FaceTime for dating".
For Cécile Gueret, this is also the moment to be able to be more yourself with the other person: "to truly meet the other, to really engage in the relationship, to be in less superficial relationships, more intimate in the sense of what we can reveal about ourselves, say what matters to us, what makes sense , which is essential. "
If the desire to develop the letter-writing relationship is felt, it will therefore be necessary to show patience and a little imagination.
A first video meeting?
The most impatient can opt for a first date on video. According to Happn's in-app survey, 54% of users have considered the famous "first date" on video, via FaceTime for example, and this figure continues to increase.
The app Ounce, meanwhile, makes available a new free feature to allow you to meet your match in live-video. The option will only be available if the two parties have exchanged in writing before and have consented to the video meeting. ‘’ I’ve been talking to a guy for a few weeks with whom I got hooked up, we had an appointment but the confinement happened just before. Since then, we regularly call to get our news and we think, why not, of a video date ’’ admits Mathilde, 26.
Because if the confinement does not allow to cross the course of the physical meeting, nothing prevents getting to know behind a screen and even to make an appointment and fix a date, as for a dated IRL in short. And not only in France. Tinder makes available its "Passport" function, usually reserved for premium members, to match and chat with singles on the other side of the world. It is also a way to escape and listen to others during this unprecedented period of isolation. And who knows, may be able to lead to a nice meeting …
"Whatever our expectations for these dates (sexual or emotional encounter), we have to do well remotely, by video, on the phone" explains Cécile Gueret. And to add: "Maybe this is also an opportunity to take the time to feel if it gives us pleasure, satisfaction, or if it would rather tend to depress us. And if it is, is it, then the opportunity to get apps that can be addictive. "