'Shorter Men Make Better Husbands'...

Guest Blogger: Katy Miller

A recent study has found that shorter men make the best husbands; they’re less likely to divorce and they do more around the house. The research was met with a lot of attention across the globe, making people reassess their own ideals and also question the study’s results. It also made me question how we use online dating and whether or not we’re doing it right.

First things first, what are the findings of the study?

So after collecting data over a long period of time, 2 sociologists from New York University found that shorter men have more stable marriages than their taller peers.

The reason why, (as discussed in a fantastic article from Adam Gopnik) is that shorter men are 'Desperate to prevail'…

'An instinctive sense of the odds, born in school yards and playgrounds, tells the short man to redouble his efforts in every area of his life.'

The argument is that shorter men are so scared of being wiped out by their taller peers, that they put a hell of a lot more effort into stuff. They work harder and they try harder to succeed, both in their professional and home lives. Gopnik makes an interesting comparison as to why this might be:

'Countries and city states with few or no resources – the short lands, one might call them – must rely on their ingenuity and effort, as Singapore and Switzerland do. They end up being more productive despite – indeed, because – they have so much less to work with.'

i.e, resources easily found, are easily squandered. Which does kinda make sense. According to Gopnik, shorter guys have had to fight a bit more for what they want, and so they're really good at holding on to it once they have it. Translate that into 'dating speak,' and you've got a guy who is appreciative of what he has, a guy that doesn't take anything for granted. Qualities that we'd no doubt like to see in any potential partner.

What’s this got to do with Online Dating?

A lot of us are so sure that we have a ‘type’ that we instinctively disregard anyone that doesn’t conform to it. The term drilled into us from the moment we first watched Cinderella is ‘tall, dark and handsome’ Note, tall. The media has told us that Prince Charming is not a short man, not even a man of average height, nope, he must be tall.

The internet has enabled us to effectively apply this list of criteria to our search for love and romance. Literally. Online Dating sites pride themselves on being able to find your perfect match; using algorithms based on your search criteria they can fish out your ideal guy or girl. Great! But let’s face it; most of us are terrible at deciding what we need. We go by these ideals formed by Disney Princes and Calvin Klein models, and not actually by what would make us happy. So by filtering down our results to such a specific criteria, we’re probably losing out.

Now don’t get me wrong, that tool is wonderful in a lot of ways. If you want to find someone who has similar hobbies, passions, beliefs etc., then you can easily, but once in a while, why not take the cosmetic filters off (height, weight, hair colour…) and give someone that you’d otherwise disregard a chance.

Perhaps if we forget about what we think we want, and instead be a little more open minded - we might have a better chance of meeting an actual real life Prince Charming. And not just day dreaming about the dude that only liked Cinderella when she had her make-up on.

So, do a little test...head to Flirtify and leave off the filters. See what happens!