Family Characteristics and Mate Selection: Evidence from Computer-Assisted Dating in Japan

Research on mate selection rarely considers singles' preferences for their future partners' family configurations and experiences. Using online dating records from a major matchmaking agency in Japan, a society with a strong emphasis on family and kinship, we examine how singles' responses to date requests correspond to potential mates' family circumstances. Results from fixed-effects logit models are consistent with the argument that singles' preferences for potential partners' family characteristics stem from both a concern about future obligations toward the partner's family and stereotypes associated with certain family traits. Singles, for example, are less likely to accept requests from those from large families, which are seen as traditional. Being from a large family nevertheless hampers individuals' dating chances considerably more if they are firstborn and have no brothers, two conditions that make them the designated child to care for elderly parents. We also find that Japanese singles largely seek partners with more of the universally valued family traits, rather than traits similar to their own.