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How do these
work? BBC Radio 4's More or Less reporter Ruth Alexander explains.
Some might pin their hopes on a chance encounter or eyes meeting
across a crowded room. But I'm taking a more evidence-based approach to
love. I've signed up with an online dating agency which uses complex
mathematical equations to analyse your personality and tell you who you
ought to go out with.
It's one of several websites which say their match-making
methods are scientific and proven to create the happiest of relationships.
First of all, the website invites me to answer a long
questionnaire. How much reassurance do I need from a partner? How much do I
give to charity? How tidy is my home?
The bow-tie and waistcoat had gone, and my date was tall,
dark and more handsome than his photo had suggested
Ruth Alexander
"The majority of questions represent statements commonly heard
by therapists in couples counselling," says True.com psychologist, Dr Garth
Bellah.
The website then uses what statisticians call a regression
equation to determine what sort of person I would be best matched with,
according to my character and how that fits with historical data about other
people's relationships.
The company says it's identified 99 distinct factors found in
successful relationships. Another dating site says there are 29 - its
mathematical match-making is based on research it says it's done on 10,000
married couples.
Looking at the profiles of the men the computer highlighted for
me, I was highly sceptical, bordering on horrified. But I gritted my teeth
and sent a flurry of e-mails: would you like to go on a date with me and my
microphone?
It turns out the compatibility test doesn't yet measure aversion
to journalists. Only two people e-mailed back - and one of those dumped me
for someone else before we'd even met.
Crowd wisdom
So I was left with one chance of love. And he was wearing a
burgundy bow-tie and waistcoat. But our compatibility score was 94%. The
computer said yes.
"Don't know much about algebra..."
How can a computer know more about me than me? Author of Super
Crunchers, Ian Ayres, says such sites "represent a new wisdom of the crowd -
where if you aggregate the predictions of hundreds of people you can do a
better job of prediction - because they're unlocking the wisdom that is
hidden within thousands of pieces of historical data.
"You're still extracting information from the crowd, but you're
finding stuff that individuals would never have been able to figure out
themselves."
By the time, I alighted the train in Guildford, my legs had gone
shaky. But the bow-tie and waistcoat had gone, and my date was tall, dark
and more handsome than his photo had suggested.
8pm: Off to the pub. By the time we'd ordered drinks and sat
down, conversation had ranged from the weather through to the Russian
language. He was easy to talk to; I was impressed. But was this maths making
the match?
I'd done some preparation before the date, having been to see
psychologist Dr Viren Swami. When I told him an algorithm was going to find
me love, he was unimpressed.
Physical attraction
"There was famous study in the 1960s, which invited participants
to take part in a dating programme," says Dr Swami, of the University of
Westminster. "They were told they would be matched by a super computer
according to personality and values.
"...don't know what a slide rule is for"
The experimenters found the best predictor of relationship
initiation was not in fact things like similarity, personality or values,
but similarity of physical attraction. But there was also an effect of
expectancy: people who believed the computer was really doing something
wonderful were more likely to make an effort with their potential partner."
The dating websites which use these equations of love promise
great things. One of them says 90 of its members get married to each other
every day. But what proportion of its members does that represent? It won't
say.
What's more, the sites disagree about what compatibility is. The
one I'm trying says complementary types work best together. Another says
people who are similar make the best match.
9pm: my date and I like each other enough to start insulting
each other. London-types have a reputation, he tells me. Judging by my
photo, he'd assumed I was going to be "wine bars only". I admit I had
thought he would be posh and bumbling.
Number crunching
10.15pm: I'll be in touch, I say. But on the train home, a
thought occurs to me. Where was the chemistry? That mysterious quality that
eludes even the most complex of dating algorithms.
Figures are all very fine, but what about them chemistry?
"People still have to see if that spark's there," says Dr Galen
Buckwalter, from dating agency eHarmony.
"We don't measure things like chemistry. But we give people
information on long-term personality traits and the fact that their match
meets the criteria identified by extensive research - and that's very
important information".
But doesn't this hard-headed number-crunching ultimately take
the romance out of romance?
Author Ian Ayres: "If we're really going to do a super-crunching
approach to this we'd want to know how much chemistry there is on your
average date - really you'd want to compare it to a blind date your close
friend set you up on."
Could it be me, and not the equation, that's a damp squib?
He added: "If you have the image that the only true romance is
where you literally knock into someone while you're walking down the street
that, I think, is a recipe for disaster."
Maybe so, but I don't think there will be a second date. And
there was something slightly irritating about having a computer deciding
what I was like and who I should fancy. I know my single status shows a lack
of past judgement, but I'm not ready to give up on my own mind yet.
You can download More or Less here or hear it on Radio 4's
Listen Again site.
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7113595.stm
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