By Kristine Pascual, April 16, 2024
During her second semester at CPP, Jenaveve Gregory started dating her boyfriend whom she held a relationship with for 10 months. Coming into college, Gregory came in with the expectation that she would have romantic experiences at CPP but had no idea how dating would come to fruition.
Gregory later on had one situationship which lasted for about three months. Today, she is single.
Dating is inevitable, especially between the years of high school and college. It is undoubtedly a big part of the college experience along with situationships, friends with benefits and hookup culture. Many factors such as social media, dating apps and a post-pandemic world influence the dating culture at Cal Poly Pomona.
“They were overall pretty good,” Gregory said. “But even with the bad parts, I think I learned a lot of lessons from both.”
Gregory is single and focusing on discovering more of herself while in college. She feels that at this point of her life, she is ready for things like relationships to come to her rather than seeking them out.
“(College) is definitely kind of a transitional period and we’re just starting to play adulthood in college so I think a challenge would be commitment and really figuring out what you want and your desires,” Gregory said.
Architecture students, Iris Ngyuen and Alex Dorantes have been dating for five months. The two met working together at housing services and hit it off this past summer. Sitting together eating lunch outside Building 1, the couple spoke out about dating culture in today’s social media tainted world.
“We’ve talked about the couples we see on TikToks, and social media and we think they’re cool and interesting,” Ngyuen said. “They tend to be really trendy, fashionable people or they go out doing things that you usually need money to do, and we try to be more like that. We end up comparing ourselves to them which isn’t necessarily a good thing.”
Navigating dating in college can be difficult but with the added pressures and expectations of social media, it’s challenging. According to a study by Pew Research Center, social media apps often promote unrealistic expectations in posts leading to insecurities and issues within a relationship. Having an online presence can also lead to digital jealousy where users have access to their partner’s ex relationships, situationships or even talking stages. Couples may even come across roadblocks with online communication due to lack of nonverbal cues. Primarily communicating via text message eliminates body language, tone and facial expressions which can lead to affecting a relationship.
With social media influencers taking over apps like TikTok, users are becoming used to seeing picture perfect couples online. Generation Z spent a chunk of their years on phones during COVID-19. Having nothing to do during lockdown, Gen Z often resorted to their phones on social media or streaming apps for entertainment. The pandemic is a topic of discussion Ngyuen and Dorantes have talked about.
“Since COVID, people just don’t put themselves out there anymore,” Ngyuen said. “They don’t sit with other people when they’re in the dining hall; people are a lot more reserved.
Many CPP students are commuters, and with most students coming to campus for class and leaving immediately afterward, making genuine connections and dating is hard to come by. Reddit users often write complaints about feeling lonely on campus.
“Honestly, because it’s a commuter school it’s not relationship heavy from what I’ve seen, people kind of do their own thing,” Gregory said.
Though Gen Z was born into a technology filled world, less and less of them are joining dating apps. According to a 2023 Statista survey, the majority of online dating users from the United States are millennials coming in at 61% whereas Gen Z falls at just 26%.
Gregory tried dating apps including Hinge and Tinder but soon realized they were not for her. She preferred to meet people in real life, feeling that was her only way to make genuine connections.
“I don’t think I would do dating apps again,” Gregory said. “It’s a place to go to when you are really looking for something but now, I’m at a place where I just want things to come to me.”
Online dating isn’t as negative as it may seem. Though there is a stigma attached to online dating, there are instances where the use of online dating has resulted in finding the perfect match.
“We’ve had friends that met on dating apps that are doing really well,” Dorantes said. “They’re like the married type and I know people, including me, used to shame her and make fun of her for being on Tinder but they’re doing really well.”
Anthropology professor Amy Dao explained the history of dating or what was once called “courtship.”
“I would say dating is pretty new,” Dao said. “Dating is predicated on the idea that the people in the relationship are choosing each other. Historically, people got married because of strategic reasons, like they needed to bring up a family and it was mostly strategy.”
Today, relationships can be seen as a foundation of love and understanding. Years ago, many countries had arranged marriages where parents would pick their daughter’s husbands. It was not a marriage for love but one for security. Some countries still have arranged marriages today, specifically in Asian cultures like Japan and India.
“Today, you have a marriage where two people choose to be with each other,” Dao said. “But in other cultures, parents choose who their children marry, they don’t get to choose.”
More and more young people today are putting a pause on sex and doing so with fewer partners compared to their parents’ generation. The COVID-19 pandemic played a role in Gen Z’s hesitancy toward pursuing sexual encounters but is not fully to blame. In 2021, a survey done by California Health Interview Survey showed that 38% of Californians aged 18-30 reported having no sexual partners. A decade prior, that number was at 22%.
It’s easy to assume that because Gen Z was born into a tech generation, they would act at most online daters. According to Hinge, 56% of Gen Z users stop themselves from pursuing relationships due to the fear of being rejected. They are also less inclined to pop the big question to their budding significant other, “What are we?”
Oftentimes a friend with benefits will slowly fizzle into what Gen Z calls a “situationship.” A situationship is defined as a gray area between a friend with benefits and an official relationship. Those who are in a situationship may have feelings for each other but are still afraid to admit feelings, settle down and commit. However, if one wishes to have a relationship with their situationship, admitting feelings and setting boundaries is important to progress in the relationship.
When it comes to open versus closed relationships, according to Scripps News, can have advantages and disadvantages depending on the person. Typically, an open relationship is an agreement between partners that they may have sexual relations with people outside of their relationship. Navigating an open relationship can be tricky if both parties are not on the same page.
Whether single or taken, being in a relationship isn’t a rite of passage during college. Each person is different, and everyone is on their own life trajectory. But before getting into a relationship, it is important for the individual to get to know themselves more before trying to commit to someone else.
“Understand that in a long-term relationship you can be dating the same person physically but have different phases of your relationship and that’s OK,” Dao said.
Feature image courtesy of Alexander Novoa
