This spring, a male friend told me: “Meeting girls in college is hard. I’m signing up for eHarmony.’’ I was shocked. This was someone with the swagger of a bullfighter and a track record of female seduction. I’d personally seen him shepherd starry-eyed underclassmen into the recesses of frat houses with remarkable finesse. When I asked him why he wanted to try online dating, his answer was simple: He was tired of doing all the legwork. He liked the idea of sorting and screening his romantic prospects from the comfort of his dorm room. Why waste time sifting through the dating pool in college when a website can do it for you?
In 2007, eHarmony lowered the minimum age for completing its membership questionnaire from 21 to 18. When I inquired as to the reasons for this change, an eHarmony spokesman obliquely informed me that “people who share common values, attitudes, personality traits, and interests are more likely to understand each other better and have an easier time negotiating their differences, making for a happier relationship over the long haul.’’
But Mark Brooks, who runs a consulting firm for online dating sites, said interest in online dating among young people has increased over the past few years. “These youngsters started on social networks; they warmed up on Friendster, they drifted to MySpace, then Facebook,’’ he said. “They are used to having a world of choice under their fingertips, and they are more demanding of a good match. They’re already accustomed to, ‘Search, there it is. Search, there it is.’ They know they have options.’’ And so, according to Brooks, today’s 18-to-22-year-olds are far more likely to look for love online than previous generations were.
The online dating arena offers a dizzying array of prospects for the college-age set. Most dating sites like eHarmony, Match.com, and the Jewish dating site JDate accept members 18 and older. Others like Universityloveconnection.com (which boasts more than 50,000 users) and Campushook.com are restricted to people enrolled in school; Studentlove.com requires users to have a “.edu’’ e-mail address to sign up.
In the spirit of trying to gauge the pulse of the college online dating “movement,’’ I trolled some websites and spoke to a few students and recent college graduates about their experiences (none wanted their last names published).
James, 22, created an account on Match.com because he thinks young people are more likely to linger in the purgatory of “just friends’’ than they once were. “In my parents’ generation, if you were spending a lot of time with a girl, it meant you were dating exclusively,’’ he told me. “Now, the lines are blurred.’’ He has been on dates with five women he met online. His modus operandi is to pick out a few aspects of a woman’s profile and send her a personalized message. “I’m pretty selective, to be honest,’’ he said.
Nathan, 20, a college student from Cambridge, also signed up for Match .com. He hasn’t been on any dates so far, but he has exchanged e-mails with five or six women. He likes to scour a profile and stick to the basics: college major, favorite movies, music. Girls who like Johnny Cash get extra points. “Online dating is instant gratification,’’ he said. “You want to know right away whether someone is interested. For my generation, when you’re writing a research paper, you don’t have to go to the library - you just Google. And online, you can wink at a woman, and she either winks back at you or she doesn’t.’’
Rachel, 20, a college student in Boston, signed up for both Studentlove.com and JDate. She was tired of campus “hookup culture’’ and decided she was ready for a boyfriend. On JDate, she met a guy who went to Emerson. She liked his photo, which was black and white and mysterious. She liked that he did stand-up comedy and that he didn’t take himself too seriously in his profile. But when they met for lunch, her first thought was: “He did not look that short online.’’ By the second date, the chemistry had waned.
For a generation hooked on instant gratification, maybe online dating is a natural outgrowth of social networking. Maybe we can even genetically engineer the perfect date by weeding out unfunny profiles and ungainly photos. But for some, the Internet ultimately falls short. “I let my account run out, and then I met someone,’’ Rachel said. “In real life.’’
Laura Bennett can be reached at lbennett@globe.com. 
