The Role Of Social And Modern Media In Romantic Courtship Initiation

Abstract

The rise of social and modern media has created new ways to engage in courtship, examined in the current thesis. Passive indirect methods, and information gathering strategies, are becoming the new norm. Study One examined the extent to which people use social and modern media for courtship initiation, their motivations, and the types of relationships that people seek to form. Results suggested that indirect courtship was more popular than direct, for both males and females; and that males were more likely to use social media to seek sex, and females to gather information. Participants were more comfortable ascribing higher motivations to others rather than themselves, indicating that others would use social media due to the ability to gather information, ease of use, and the relative indirectness. Participants also felt that a potential date would judge their information gathering more negatively than the participant reported they would judge their date for the same behaviour. Study Two focused on how people use information gathering, and the role that online anonymity plays in fuelling these behaviours. Results reinforced the increasing reliance on indirect courtship, as well as highlighting the importance of anonymity – when removed, participants reported they would adapt their behaviour by reducing information gathering, and increasing strategies to regain anonymity. Several individual difference variables predicted greater information gathering and an increased importance placed on anonymity. Data from both studies on the perceived acceptability of courtship initiation behaviours, ranging from traditional and mundane to highly maladaptive, were also examined using an exploratory factor analysis. This indicated an underlying structure consisting of four different groups of modern courtship behaviours, which could be labelled as ‘indirect or social media’, ‘direct or traditional’, obsessive’, and ‘threatening’, in order of decreasing acceptability.