There’s also the issue of trust. Although online-dating sites create a false sense of immediate intimacy — I know she loves margaritas and pugs! — it may actually take a while for these relationships to mature, since there’s no shared social network. “Theoretically, these profiles are helping us develop intimacy, but they really don’t help us develop trust, because trust is related to how much you disclose yourself to me, how vulnerable you make yourself to me,” explained Paul. “I don’t develop any of that just by reading information in your profile. You’re pretty much meeting a perfect stranger.”
The effect? If you hit a bump in the road three months into your relationship, you may be more likely to split, since your bond may not be as strong as if you’d met offline, say, through a friend.
These factors may also explain why couples who met online were less likely to tie the knot than those who first crossed paths in the real world.