Game Theory Explains the Dating Disparity?

A couple of articles focused on dating and the single woman’s dilemma have surfaced recently on several prominent Web sites. I wrote a critique of Mark Gimein's game theory article on Slate that alters my initial position on a Salon.com piece from 2005.

Originally part of my internship app, my critique goes to waste as they’ve already finished hiring for the summer (in that case, maybe update the Web site, eh?). Anyhow, enjoy:

In “The Eligible-Bachelor Paradox,” Mark Gimein begins with a fitting allusion to Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, referring to what he calls one of “the great riddles of social life”: the lack of single, eligible men in the dating pool. It has become an unquestionable part of conventional wisdom—indeed, a recurring theme in contemporary commentary on gender relations —that a surfeit of appealing, eligible women overwhelms an effete, flawed male population. Gimein offers an explanation for such an imbalance: because of a “women choose” model for marriage, females enter into an auction scenario in which “strong bidders,” realizing they have fine prospects for a mate, stubbornly hold out for Mr. Right. Meanwhile, the “weak bidders,” their less appealing sisters, bid early and aggressively, thereby securing husbands while simultaneously draining the dating pool of quality, one man at a time.

As a woman who has dated extensively in New York City—arguably the nation’s dating disparity capital (if one is to use social statistics and pop culture references like Sex and the City as indicators)—I am in the awkward position of wanting very much to believe Gimein’s theory, personally, but finding it difficult to uphold, intellectually. While the author’s use of game theory and economics offers the comfort of academic rigor to illuminate the eligible-bachelor paradox, I challenge the basic premise that there are significantly more “attractive, eligible women” out there than “highly eligible and appealing men.” This underlying assumption also serves as the basis for Benjamin Kunkel’s commentary on Salon, as well as Lori Gottlieb’s “Buy It Now” argument posed in The Atlantic, referenced at the end of Gimein’s essay.

Perceptions of such an overwhelming disparity merit closer examination if they are to be used to advocate going on a massive sexual strike or settling for a loveless marriage, as the other two authors suggest. I use the word “perception” deliberately, because the flaw I see in Gimein’s argument rests with the definition of “strong bidders”—a perceived group of fantastic women who are underserved by the male population. Many of my single female friends possess the qualities generally associated with “strong bidders”: they are attractive, educated, and charming. During late-night chats with such friends, these traits are cited as evidence that men have it easier in the dating world because attractive, single women abound. I listened to and participated in such talks to the point that this dating gap—the eligible-bachelor paradox—registered in our collective consciousness as undisputed fact.

But I had to step back and take a closer look at my perennially single female friends. While each satisfies the loose definition of a “strong bidder,” they also tend to have various fundamental flaws that fall into a general category of emotional/personality issues, which disqualify them as the “great catches” so heavily advertised. This slippery quality—complex and specific to each woman, and therefore not easily generalizable to entire populations—is usually omitted from the criteria of “strong bidders,” despite the significant role it must play in the actual world of dating. And since such personality flaws are not as overtly apparent as height or underemployment (to borrow Gimein’s examples of male imperfection), they also manage to go undetected until much later in the dating game. Thus, where Gimein sees an abundance of single, attractive women, I see a number of single, attractive women who—although “strong bidders” by his definition—possess just as many deal breakers, although better concealed, as the men he calls “notably imperfect.” While I concede that a dating disparity exists, I believe it is on a much smaller scale than popularly imagined: many of the perceived “strong bidders” in this particular auction are simply bluffing.

Penn(itentiary) State

April has been a rough month, with back-to-back academic papers, a crash course on statistics and research methodology (I can now perform a simple regression analysis along with other helpful functions), and writing/reporting for my favorite local Amsterdam newspaper.

Last week, the editor in chief entrusted me to interview a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and investigative reporter for The New Yorker. Unfortunately, his schedule and our weekly deadline could not agree, and I worked on another piece instead. It's been a great learning experience, copyediting features in the British style, whilst getting some clips under the belt.

The gig is not without its fun moments. Listen to this amusing clip from an interview I had with a local professor about a Dutch social engineering project (I was giving him my email address). I should send it to Penn State's admissions/recruiting office.