Age brings new romance with byte

Malta’s qualitative research has involved in-depth interviews with 25 female and 20 male Australian volunteers aged 60 to 92, as well as five Americans. Two-thirds (31) of the Australian participants had met new partners online and one-third (14) in person, allowing comparisons to be made across the two groups.

Malta says she wanted to see if technology made a difference to the relationship: whether they were longer-lasting or became sexual more quickly if they first met online rather than face-to-face.

Although it may have been presumed that the online group would progress to a sexual relationship more quickly -- partly because their mean age was 63, compared with 71 for the face-to-face group -- her research showed both groups became intimate at similar speeds.

For the online romance group, 25 of 31 reported sexual relations occurred between five days and eight weeks; for the face-to-face group, nine of 14 reported sexual relations between one week and nine weeks.

"With there being almost a decade difference in their mean age, you would expect there may be less sexuality in the face-to-face group, but no," Malta says.

'Harry', 71, who met his partner online, said sexual relations happened 'very quickly' after meeting. "We were immediately attracted to each other," he says.

Meanwhile 'Nelson', 79, who was first introduced to his new partner in person, had an even faster courtship. "We went for coffee, then we went to dinner, then we went to bed," he says.

But while there was little variance between her two older groups, Malta did find significant differences between her online sample and the behaviour of a younger group of internet daters – median age 30 – who took part in a University of British Columbia study in Canada.

"My older adults were more overtly sexual online," says Malta, hypothesising that this is because 'they could be'.

"They weren’t looking for life partners or someone they could have children with and be with for the rest of their lives. Those issues were not as relevant and they could just get straight to the point."

Malta says that while most of the relationships in her online and face-to-face groups became sexual quickly, it appeared the face-to-face partnerships lasted longer.

But rather than being a negative, she says this could be because people did not feel they had to stay in the online-instigated relationship if it was not quite right.

"If you meet someone face-to-face, the pool of people you have to pick from is not very large, but online there is an infinite number of people that you can connect with, so maybe you can afford to be a bit fussier," she says.

This also complements the attitude of many older people looking for new relationships; after often having been married young, they will not settle for just anyone.

"The women in particular say, ‘I’m not going to do somebody’s washing and cooking any more’. So I think maybe it’s a different mindset, and maybe if you do use a computer to find a partner, then perhaps you have a different mindset to start with."

One of the tools available for people using computers for dating is cybersex, and Malta found that eight of her online group of 31 had engaged in it. For some it had become part of their sexual repertoire, while others had tried it once and decided it was not for them – much like the population in general, she says.

"The one that really caught my eye though was the person who said she would never go out with anybody that she had had cybersex with: cybersex was her casual sex encounter. So she would meet people online and have cybersex with them and then never meet them in person. But she would use the internet as a dating tool to meet other people."

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