Carlo Andreassi

Focus Group: Tinder, Results

Recently, I conducted a focus group for the company Tinder. This group was composed

of 6 respondents. Three of the respondents were female (aged 22, 19 and 20) and three were

male (aged 19, 19 and 20). All respondents were students at Point Park University.

This focus group was conducted on March 7th, 2022 at 8:53pm in an in-person setting.

The discussion lasted for a duration of 34 minutes.

Going into this discussion, the question I wanted answered was: are students finding the

results they desire from using Tinder? I wanted to evaluate what students’ intentions were going

into using Tinder, what they value in a dating app and what ultimately resulted from their

experience with the app. One of the participants offered an outsider’s perspective, having never

used Tinder or any other dating apps.

I began with introductions and ice-breakers. I then kicked off the discussion by asking

each respondent to rank various dating apps based on a scale of 1-5, wherein 1 represented “most

horny” and 5 represented “most platonic.” The respondents were most familiar with Tinder and

Bumble, so comparison points were drawn throughout the entire discussion. The respondents

nearly unanimously agreed that Tinder is the more “horny” app compared to Bumble. Tinder

received an average score of 3.5 and Bumble received an average score of 2.5. Everyone agreed

that Tinder is definitely more of a “hookup app,” whereas Bumble encourages relationships and

friendships, and is more “wholesome.” Everyone came to the general consensus that people

download tinder for three main reasons: boredom, sadness and loneliness.

The respondents agreed that the interface of Tinder encourages hookup culture. One

respondent said, “Tinder literally has a top picks system that shows you the most swiped people
in the area.” Of the five respondents who have used Tinder, all of them have deleted it at one

point. Three deleted it temporarily and two deleted it permanently. Their reasoning for doing so

consisted of being in a relationship, not feeling satisfaction and the app being “mentally

draining.” They felt as if Tinder gamifies romance and human interaction more so than other

dating apps. The respondent who never used Tinder said he prefers conventional methods of

meeting people, and he felt that Tinder seems to cheapen the experience to an even greater extent

than most dating apps. There was unanimous agreement that if someone were in a relationship,

having a Tinder would inherently be a betrayal of trust. Bumble was cited as being different for

having a “friends” option.

Only two of the five respondents who have used Tinder have actually found success in

finding a date from Tinder, and only one respondent reported to have had a relationship stem

from the app. Its ineffectiveness was attributed to people jumping ahead to get to know someone

on a date. The sentiment was shared that the process Tinder promotes is inherently unnatural.

Respondents also agreed that they wouldn’t share information as personal as they did in

their ice-breakers in their Tinder bio. They said they would feel more uncomfortable sharing

things like religion, political affiliation and other personal details on Tinder compared to Bumble.

The respondents shared what their intentions were going into using Tinder. Two said “to

date,” one said “for friends,” three said “a relationship” and two said “a hookup.” One of the

respondents admitted to the app being ultimately alluring due to it having less consequences.

Another respondent disagreed, saying the experience felt “awkward” when matching with people

and didn’t want to engage. One respondent said her experience was pleasant with Tinder. Her

intention was to go on dates, but her usage of the app ultimately led to several platonic

friendships.
 The key takeaways from this discussion are that Tinder is generally seen as an app for

hookups and students seem to not find what they’re looking for on the app. Although the students

admitted to the app being addictive and useful from time-to-time, the general sentiment was that

it isn’t a platform that encourages casual use. Also, students seem to not have a high success-rate

in finding what they want through Tinder, but it can often result in unexpected experiences.

What surprised me was that the group ultimately didn’t see much room for change when

it came to Tinder’s interface. Their attitude reflected the idea that Tinder serves its purpose, and

it’s okay for it to be the “hookup app.” One person said, “For a niche group of people, Tinder is

the best thing that ever happened to them, and that’s not gonna change.”

They agreed that Tinder doesn’t seem to want people to delete their app. It’s made to set

up “baseline connections,” and that’s just what some people want. However, they did share that

there is still room for improvement with the app. Some ideas shared were that the app could

feature searching people by sexual preference, add more options for gender identity, and add an

option for people to share their intentions.