Innocent dating tool or changing how we tolerate sexual harassment? Sexual scripts undergoing a Tinderification.

• In Event: Sex-related crimes and Criminal Law

Abstract

While Tinder offers many opportunities for meeting romantic and sexual partners, the medium harbours a culture of sexual harassment. A prevalence of online sexual harassment up to 70% has been reported. Own previous research highlighted the normalisation of harassing messages on Tinder. This current research analyses the normalising culture on Tinder and more specifically its impact on the sexual and dating scripts of Tinder users. Around 50 in-depth interviews were conducted with heterosexual Tinder users studying in Ghent, Belgium between 18-25 years old. These results are combined with those of the mixed-methods survey questioning 82 Tinder users and 185 control group respondents.

Impacts are reported on a personal, interpersonal and cultural level. On a personal level, effects were both positive and negative as Tinder boosted confidence, social skills and assertiveness while also leaving some users hopeless or frustrated. On an interpersonal level both casual sex scripts as characteristics of the traditional heterosexual script were found, most notably the presence of a sexual double standard and accompanying slut shaming. The most profound findings were the cultural effects in which sexually harassing messages are widely tolerated. Female respondents have become used to receiving them frequently, often do not label them as sexual harassment, and have developed coping mechanisms to endure them. Unwanted sexually explicit images are not normalised, yet some respondents also reacted carelessly due to habituation.

Author

• Laura Byn, Ghent University