Saint Mary’s researcher to study the effect of COVID-19 on dating, romance and sex

Dating can be difficult at the best of times, and social distancing requirements, face masks, and limited access to restaurants and bars during a global pandemic make finding new romantic partners even more difficult.

This issue has inspired a new survey that looks at how the COVID-19 pandemic has potentially changed how we feel about ourselves in terms of dating and romantic relationships. Respondents will be asked to complete a series of surveys examining their attitudes about sexuality, how many sexual partners they have had or wish to have, how they feel about themselves, and how much money they have recently spent on items related to appearance.

"This is a fascinating time to conduct research because people are having to adjust, to be creative in the way they date," said Dr. Maryanne Fisher, the Saint Mary's University researcher conducting the study. "Online dating websites are reporting a surge of membership enrollments and messages between users, which indicates people are trying to make connections, and potentially different types of connections, than ever before. I'm really intrigued by how we view ourselves as mates has changed due to the pandemic."

Dr. Maryanne Fisher, a researcher and professor of Psychology at Saint Mary's, has been studying these issues since 2017 and is tracking changes over time. She is an expert on the evolutionary foundations of human interpersonal relationships. Her primary research areas include the evolutionary foundations of human interpersonal relationships and women's mating strategies and indicators of female physical attractiveness.

This survey on the effects of COVID-19 on dating and romantic relationships, as well as perceptions of self-worth and attractiveness, will require about 20 minutes to complete. We have removed the collection of IP addresses in an effort to anonymize the responses, and you will not be asked your name or other identifying information. We are seeking volunteers 18+ to complete the confidential now.

Click here to take the survey.

Dr. Maryanne Fisher named guest editor of prestigious Psychology journal

Dr. Maryanne Fisher

Congratulations to Dr. Maryanne Fisher, who was chosen to be the guest editor of the January edition of the American Psychological Association’s journal Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences, a special edition which addresses women’s representation in evolutionary-based research and theory.

Dr. Fisher, a professor of Psychology at Saint Mary’s and an affiliate faculty member at the Kinsey Institute, is an evolutionary psychologist whose work explores human relationships through an evolutionary lens.

A well-known expert in her field, her primary research topic is the evolutionary foundations of human interpersonal relationships, female intrasexual competition, and women’s mating strategies. She is also interested in the intersection between feminist studies and evolutionary psychology.  

She was thrilled to take on the task of editing the special edition of the journal, a task she has some experience with; she was also the guest editor of the Oxford Handbook of Women and Competition in 2017 and Evolution’s Empress: Darwinian Perspectives on the Nature of Women in 2013.

When speaking about the selection process, Dr. Fisher said it was extremely difficult to narrow down the entries, even removing her own work from the contention.

“We had so many excellent papers submitted, we could have filled two journals,” said Dr. Fisher. “They were very good, very high quality.”

This special issue examines how women have been studied from an evolutionary perspective, and how the discipline both questions assumptions about women and has limited explorations of women and.

“Evolutionary perspectives have often been openly criticized in fields such as women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, to the point of being dismissed outright in favor of sociocultural explanations for behavior, motivation, emotions, and cognitions,” said Dr. Fisher.

“Collectively the articles show that women are not simply passive entities, but instead play significant and active parts in human evolution and theories about evolutionary bases of behavior.”

Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences publishes manuscripts that advance the study of human behavior from an evolutionary perspective, with an emphasis on work that integrates evolutionary theory with other approaches and perspectives from across the behavioral sciences, including the range of subdisciplines within psychology as well as the social sciences (e.g., sociology, political science, criminology) and humanities (e.g., history, literature studies).