How Can You Help Single Young Adults to Develop Dating Skills?

Strong families start with strong marriages, and strong marriages start with purposeful dating. However, dating itself is going through a drought period.

According to an opinion piece written by Alan Hawkins, Brian Willoughby, Jason Carroll,and Brad Wilcox and published in the Deseret News, there is a dating recession. 

There is good news about marriage that everyone can cheer: Marriages are becoming more stable today than they were four or five decades ago. Granted, much of this stability bonus is a result of who is marrying.

Couples with riskier profiles for marital breakup have become a decreasing proportion of all marrying couples, so couples who marry today are more likely to have a set of characteristics that lend themselves to more stable marriages. For instance, these marrying couples today are more likely to be better educated, more financially stable, more religious and less likely to marry as teens.

Regardless of its causes, greater marital stability is something to celebrate because of the known benefits that stable, healthy marriages give to children, adults and their communities. Hidden in this encouraging trend, however, is a paradox: Increasing marital stability exists alongside a strong trend of fewer adults getting married.

Rates of first marriages have fallen by more than 10% over the past two decades, continuing a steady descent since the 1970s. Demographers now estimate that as many as a third of young adults born in the early decades of the 21^st century may never marry.

It is hard to celebrate stronger marriages when fewer and fewer young people are entering into them. This is concerning news.

Numerous scholars are exploring why fewer young adults are marrying. Increased focus on post-secondary education and careers during young adulthood, along with a declining cultural emphasis on the need to be married, are commonly cited factors.

But one straightforward reason for the decline in marriage rates that has not received much attention is the dating system. If you listen to young adults, many of them will tell you that the dating system is badly broken. They are frustrated by the current dating landscape. They grumble about dating apps that present an abundance of options a mere swipe away, while also promoting an attitude of relational consumerism. And the repetitive cycle of matching, messaging and meeting that ends in disappointment is leading to significant dating fatigue and a growing cynicism about the whole process. Similarly, most young adults say they dislike the casual hook-up culture that pervades dating and its emphasis on uncommitted, one-off sexual activity over building meaningful relationships.

If the on ramps to our marital highways are bumpy, broken or blocked, it is no mystery why many young adults are struggling to reach their desired marriage destinations.

To use another analogy, the contemporary dating economy is struggling and perhaps in a recession.

The article continues by saying that there is “a healthy majority of young people today” – despite the problems with the dating system – “still desire a future that includes marriage.”

The authors analyzed “findings from our 2025 National Dating Landscape Survey, a nationally representative sample in the U.S. of 5,275 unmarried young adults in their prime dating years (ages 22-35).” Here is what they learned by focusing “mostly on the dating experiences of those single young adults who expect to marry someday (86%; N = 4,539)….”

·         Only about 1 in 3 young adults report actively dating – dating at least once a month.

·         Young adults lack confidence in their dating skills and their ability to initiate a promising romantic relationship.

·         Young adults desire a dating culture aimed at forming serious relationships.

·         Money worries, self-confidence and past bad dating experiences are big barriers in the modern dating landscape.

·         Dating resilience is low among young adults.

·         There is a dating-marriage-skills gap.

The authors continued to share the “primary, straightforward implication of the findings from our study”:

Accordingly, a primary, straightforward implication of the findings from our study is that young adults could use some basic help in building dating skills. Few are regularly dating. They report feeling unprepared and having a low sense of dating efficacy. They lack experience and social and emotional confidence, and they need to stretch their basic social skills. They struggle to know how to express their interest in a potential dating partner and to communicate effectively on a date. Also, they are discouraged by the cost of dating.

These are hardly insurmountable barriers. We have no doubt that motivated young adults can learn the dating skills they need to form healthy relationships that eventually lead to marriage.

This ideally starts with those closest to them. Parents, grandparents and close family members can take an active role in mentoring and helping young people develop the social skills, virtues and personal confidence to date. Collectively, we need to prioritize the social and relationship development of children, teens and young adults in much the same way we rigorously promote their academic or athletic development….

We are not suggesting that dating culture alone explains our current declines in marriage. Clearly, there are other influences involved, ranging from excessive screen time to the deforming effects of pervasive pornography, as well as changing attitudes toward religious practice and the much-discussed impact of political hostilities on young men and women….