Issues&ideas EDITOR DUNCAN ANDERSON | Swiping left and right on Tinder is all it takes to enter the lexicon of online dating. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY PERRIN GRAUER Protect yourself on apps The Vancouver Police Department call out for dating safety = By PERRIN GRAUER ith online dating be- coming more com- mon, the Vancouver Police Department has released a database to help us- ers establish safer dating practices. Female students in their late teens and early 20s are less likely to report assault at the hands of men they met through online dating services, according to Hilla Kerner, spokeswoman for Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter. Pro- fessionals in their late 20s and 30s are more likely to report an assault, though they are at no less risk. Det.-Const. Michelle Grandbois of the VPD says students might be at greater risk “because of age and life experience. Obviously older people will pick up on different things.” Regardless of how much life experience a person has, meeting somebody through a dating app can be a risky proposition. “Even men who meet women Join this week's podcast on dating at langaravoice. through mutual friends are not worried for their reputation and are allowing them- selves to act as sexual predators and to at- tack women,” Kern- er said. Online — dating services like Tin- der and Bumble are designed to make meeting new people easier, but the VPD warns that these apps can also be subject to abuse. The VPD database, available at catchy- ou.ca, includes tips and testimoni- als for safer dating. Nancy Pollak, coordinator of Langara’s Women’s Studies depart- ment, spoke with The Voice via email and said the dangers of internet dating are the same ones women have always faced. “In B.C., many young women enjoy varying degrees of personal freedom and choice re: dating and sexuality... But our society is still riddled with sexist double stan- dards, with long-entrenched prac- tices of sexual exploitation and coercion,” Pollak writes. “So no sur- prise that the online dating scene would also have its share of [sex of- THURSDAY, OCT. 19, 2017 | THE VOICE 7 ONLINE DATING SAFETY >» PERSONAL INFO Provide as little personal informa- tion as possible on your profile. »FOUND SOMEONE? Google search the name they have given you. >» FIRST DATE Arrange to meet in a public place away from where you live. »YOU TRUST THEM? If your date has told you where they live or work, do some check- ing to confirm. » TRUST YOUR GUT Trust your instincts - if something feels wrong, it probably is. SOURCE: CATCHYOU.CA fenders].” Kerner was also quick to point out that assault can happen no mat- ter how careful a person is. “Women who do call us about being sexually assaulted...through a man that they met online do blame themselves very much,” says Kerner. Kerner says that if anyone have been victimized, a support group can help them get a more diligent response from the criminal justice system. ‘The Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter’s 24-hour crisis line is (604) 872-8212. Students get intimate in Langara College hallway. ar4iiA BUENDIA CALVILLO PHOTO They cant be bothered Intimate relationships relieve stress but stu- dents find them costly m=By NATALIA BUENDIA CALVILLO aving an intimate relation- ship helps to reduce stress and to increase happiness, but some full-time students at Lan- gara College prefer to stay single. When students were asked about the pros and cons of dating while studying full-time, most of them said it is a distraction from school and they do not have the time. The extra study time is preferred over the health and anti-stress qualities of having a healthy relationship. Business and administration student Abhishek Parasher thinks relationships take time and cost mone “Tes. expensive. Having a girl- friend is good because you are emotionally stable but you are not financially stable,” Parasher said. Social researcher, author and sex educator, Ryan Levis, advocates having a relationship while being a student because it offers students strong emotional support. “Emotionally supportive — rela- tionships are really good for miti- gating stress,” he said. “If you have a crap relationship where you cannot discuss boundaries, then a needy or codependent relationship is going to compound the stress.” An article published in the Jour- nal of Marriage and Family in 2017, stated that healthy affectional con- nections have been linked to high- er rates of health and happiness, whereas the absence predisposes people to loneliness, dissatisfaction or low psychological well-being. Endocrinology and behavioural neuroscience researchers have at- tributed the feeling of pleasure that comes from intimate relationships to oxytocin, a molecule secreted to the bloodstream by the pituitary gland. Oxytocin, sometimes referred to as “the love hormone,” lowers stress and causes pleasure. Even with a light touch or a hug, the receptor neurons under the skin trigger the production which has anti-stress properties and makes people happy. Full-time psychology student Hadil Ahmad has a long-term partner but says students should focus on school because an inti- mate relationship, regardless of how good it makes you feel, costs time and causes distraction. Challenging times for offline daters Apps have expedited the dating process while meeting people in person remains difficult = By MYRA DIONNE wiping left or right is easy. Asking someone out in per- son remains a challenge. With so many apps and websites to simplify the dating process, of- fline interactions can still begin a relationship but it’s becoming more difficult for the general population. The problem with relying on online dating is that it is more challenging to have a real sense of someone because you are missing out on the physi- cal and verbal cues when you can't see the person, ac- cording to Gagun Chhina, a_ soci- ology teacher at Gagun Chhina = Langara College. SOCIOLOGY TEACH: = “Verbal ~~ com- ER AT LANGARA munication is mi- nor and the other information is more significant so it makes the interaction very prob- lematic in that you're reading cues all the time,” he said though ac- knowledged that “Going and being in a live venue...it's much more dif- ficult to meet people.” Langara College students Varinder Chopra and Navjeet Kaur began their relationship in person after meeting through friends on campus. “We just met at the college since we came here to Canada,” Kaur said. “She was sitting with her friend circle and from that circle, I knew just one girl,” Chopra said. “After seven or eight months, we started talking.” “... 1 feel like a lot of people are very iid reserved. — JENNIFER NGO, LANGARA STUDENT Jennifer Ngo, a single student at Langara who has dated using apps and offline, acknowledges that dat- ing is harder in person. “In this day and age, in society, I feel like it’s very hard for people to get out and try to date. Especially in this city, I feel like a lot of people are very reserved.” Chhina said that in the future, the demographic of people using dating apps will grow with age. “You're always interacting with people offline,” Chhina said. “As long as you have interactions with people, then that potential to ask out somebody or have a partner still exists.”