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Dial-Toning, White Clawing & More: 8 New Dating Problems You Probably Deal With
Every year, the dating app Plenty of Fish comes up with a list of dating trends they expect to see in the coming year. They're usually based on a survey of their current users' experiences, though, so in many ways these projections really constitute the latest common dating problems people have already been dealing with.
This year, the app polled over 1,000 of its users to put together its list. So with that, here are eight newfangled dating terms that you might see cropping up next year based on their survey. Any of them ring a bell for you?
- Cause-playing: When your relationship with someone fizzles out, but then they reach back out asking for a favor—like donating to their second cousin's fundraiser or liking their startup's new Facebook page.
- Dial-toning: When someone gives you their phone number but then completely ignore your texts. Like, why?
- Eclipsing: When you just automatically take on the hobbies, interests, and passions of the person you're dating. (PoF found 45% of singles admitted to having done this, and another recent survey found 27% have even hidden one of their own interests from potential partners because they worried it'd make them seem unattractive for some reason. But the truth is, everyone needs alone time and their own separate lives, even in the most committed relationships.)
- Glamboozled: When you get all dressed up and ready for a date, but then they cancel at the very last minute. Argh!
- Kanye'd: When you go on a date and they spend literally the entire evening talking about themselves.
- Type-casting: When someone chooses people to date exclusively based on their Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) compatibility or their love language compatibility. You can probably throw in astrology, Enneagram types, or any other buzzy personality system.
- White Clawing: When you keep dating someone you find "basic and boring" (PoF's words, not ours…) just because they're attractive.
- Yellow-carding: When you call out the person you're dating for their bad dating etiquette. Think when you need to tell your Bumble match to stop messaging you 43 times a day and asking you why you're not responding.
Look, all of us are probably guilty of at least one of these relationship faux-pas. But self-awareness is the first step toward change, OK? OK.
Kelly Gonsalves is a multi-certified sex educator and relationship coach helping people figure out how to create dating and sex lives that actually feel good — more open, more optimistic, and more pleasurable. In addition to working with individuals in her private practice, Kelly serves as the Sex & Relationships Editor at mindbodygreen. She has a degree in journalism from Northwestern University, and she’s been trained and certified by leading sex and relationship institutions such as The Gottman Institute and Everyone Deserves Sex Ed, among others. Her work has been featured at The Cut, Vice, Teen Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and elsewhere.
With her warm, playful approach to coaching and facilitation, Kelly creates refreshingly candid spaces for processing and healing challenges around dating, sexuality, identity, body image, and relationships. She’s particularly enthusiastic about helping softhearted women get re-energized around the dating experience and find joy in the process of connecting with others. She believes relationships should be easy—and that, with room for self-reflection and the right toolkit, they can be.
You can stay in the loop about her latest programs, gatherings, and other projects through her newsletter: kellygonsalves.com/newsletter