Cosmo’s AI Advice & Love Languages Lesson
It’s 2024 and AI is here to stay. The question is, how will it impact your dating life? The answer…well, a lot. From photo generators to language models to analyzing past relationships and offering advice, we’re essentially on a collision course with the 2013 Joaquin Phoenix movie, Her.
But it turns out that the news is not all bad – actually it’s pretty good if you’re willing to give it a listen!
Cosmopolitan Magazine recently teamed up with Bumble to conduct an AI & Dating Survey, made up of over 5,000 singles and actively dating Gen Z’ers and Millennials ages 18 to 42.
And here to break down the findings with us today is none other than the Deputy Editor of Cosmopolitan herself, Madeleine Reeves! She will be sharing key data, what we can expect and how to navigate the intersection of technology and love.
But first we have a steamy hot dating dish to serve up for you – New science concludes the love languages are nothing but fluff.
DATING DISH (2:03)
The study covers the work of Toronto based researcher, Amy Muse, which puts forward proof that most people like all of the love languages. The work proposes a balanced diet metaphor for expressing love and says that we need diverse and evolving expressions of affection in relationships. Ultimately, the new research says that Doctor Chapman’s measure pits the love languages against each other.
If you’ve read F The Fairy Tale, then you know that Damona has been skeptical of the love languages for some time despite their on-going popularity. She points out that “we are far more complex than any label on a dating app, any hashtag on TikTok, or any simple phrase could sum up.”
MADELEINE REEVES (8:22)
Madeleine Reeves is the deputy editor at Cosmopolitan and oversees all the sex, dating, and relationship content for Cosmo.
With more than a decade of magazine industry experience in editing, writing, and reporting, she now recruits writers, sources, and pitches, and shapes stories and lineups for both the site and the print magazine. She also assigns and edits celebrity profiles, including Cosmo’s cover stories.
(10:35) What stood out in Cosmopolitan and Bumble’s AI & Dating survey?
Madeleine shared that she was a little surprised to find that the survey results around AI & dating were overwhelmingly positive. “I thought it would be a bit more split as far as people’s eagerness to accept AI into their dating lives.” But she shared these key stats:
- 71% of people say that they would use AI to help set up their profile
- 81% say that they would share their whole messaging history with a dating bot coach to give them advice on what to do next
- 59% say they would rather ask AI than their friends for help choosing a picture for their profile
Damona agrees that AI is going to be better than your friends, but she says a dating coach will always be more helpful than AI. “The difference between what I would say and what Bumble’s tools would say is they’re just going based on swipes, and I’m going based on connection and results.”
(14:48) Make AI your assistant, not your replacement.
Damona often suggests to listeners and clients to think of AI as a tool. “We put so much pressure on them to do all of the work for us, where if we can just use it as a data point of like, oh, well, that’s interesting. Now I know that piece and fill in the rest with our brains and our hearts, then it’s a lot more useful.”
Madeleine says that ended up being the thesis of the AI & Dating survey. “You don’t want to rely on these tools to do it all for you, because you want to use them to show up as authentically yourself, you know? So if you’re getting prompts of, here are some things you can say, you want to be personalizing those even further, using it as a jumping off point, using it as an assistant, and not as a replacement for yourself.”
(18:49) Madeleine’s hope for AI & Dating
Madeleine points out that if you’re online dating without the help of a coach, then you’re kind of just swiping based on how well the other person takes photos, writes quippy answers to prompts, and how well they flirt. She laughs when she says these aren’t the qualities she looks for in a partner, but she means it. Her hope is that it will be a good tool “for folks who maybe aren’t the best at writing a quippy, flirty phrase; that they can turn to these tools to help them do it in a way that feels authentic to them.”
Find Madeleine on Instagram @madeleinefrankreeves, Cosmopolitan on Instagram @Cosmopolitan and check out Cosmo & Bumble’s AI & Dating Study for yourself by visiting: https://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/a46574186/ai-dating/
DEAR DAMONA (35:36)
Submit your questions on Instagram, X, TikTok, or Facebook, and hear Damona’s answers live in a future episode!
IG DM from Anonymous
Hi Damona, I’m a new listener and I’ve really enjoyed your podcast and perspective!
I’m in my late 20s and until recently I didn’t have a strong desire to be in a relationship. I was never really a boy crazy child or teen. I had crushes but was a shyer kid so didn’t put much into exploring that. In college I got a fair amount of attention but again I didn’t see the point in committing to a relationship because I felt like I had all my needs met with my social relationships.
Now as an adult something about it feels physically uncomfortable. I know personally that I am so skeptical about people’s intentions and feel like I attract men that think I’m a challenge because I don’t actively seek their attention. I tried once going on a dating app but it felt really inauthentic.
I’d love to just be set up by a friend but I’ve been told that they don’t think they know anyone good enough for me which is kind but not helpful. What do I do??
