It’s time to do the same for gay hookup apps. Other dating apps, like Tinder, for example, are now the subject of early research looking at mental health implications. This suggests it’s time we start thinking about Grindr’s health effects more broadly. Yet since 2007, more gay men have died from suicide than from HIV. Though there is this new attention to sexual health, both Grindr and the research community have been silent on mental health. (The company later said it would stop sharing the information.) In less pleasant news, BuzzFeed revealed on Monday that Grindr has also been sharing the HIV status of its users with third-party companies. Just last week, Grindr announced that it will start sending users HIV testing reminders and the addresses of local testing sites (on an opt-in basis). Early research on app use and health has focused only on sexually transmitted infections, for instance, rates of HIV among Grindr users, using Grindr to get people tested for STIs, etc. The phrase “addiction” continues to be controversial when it comes to sex and technology, But as John Pachankis, an LGBTQ mental health expert at the Yale School of Public Health, described the impact of Grindr to me: “I don’t know if it’s an ‘addiction,’ but I know it causes a lot of distress.”įor now, it’s hard to know just how many Grindr users feel their use of the app is problematic. This is potentially a powerful recipe for addiction and may explain why one user I spoke with stays on Grindr for up to 10 hours at a time, hoping to find the perfect partner for casual sex. Now imagine a slot machine that rewards you with an orgasm at unpredictable intervals. They hold out hope that the next pull will give them the pleasurable sound of coins clanking against a metal bin, and they end up pulling for hours. Because gamblers never know when the next payout will come, they can’t stop pulling the handle. Variable ratio reinforcement is one of the most effective ways to reinforce behavior, and it makes stopping that behavior extremely difficult. You may find a hookup immediately, or you may be on your phone for hours before you find one. Grindr, intentionally or not, also leverages a psychological concept called variable ratio reinforcement, in which rewards for clicking come at unpredictable intervals. This can be a normal pleasure response or it could be a setup for addiction, depending on the situation and individual. So when a neutral action (clicking on Grindr) is paired with a pleasurable response in the brain (orgasm), humans learn to do that action over and over again.
And these patterns of activation in men are strikingly similar to what researchers see in the brain of individuals using heroin or cocaine. Neuroscientists have shown that orgasm causes activation of pleasure areas of the brain like the ventral tegmental area while deactivating areas involved with self-control. With a few clicks, there’s a possibility of meeting a sexual partner within the hour.
The screen full of half-naked men excites users. The most common reason users gave for going on the app is that sex feels great and Grindr makes it accessible, right at your fingertips. And that can make them hard to stop using. Apps like Grindr are designed to make finding sex easy. It’s a small sample size, but enough to give us some clues about how Grindr is affecting gay men. I received about 50 responses (including propositions). I created a profile identifying myself as a medical writer looking to talk to men about their experiences. Since there’s little published research on the men using Grindr, I decided to conduct an informal survey and ask men why they’re on the app so much and how it’s affecting their relationships and mental health. I am all for sexual liberation, but I can’t stop wondering if these apps also have a negative effect on gay men’s mental health.
Apps like Grindr, with 3 million daily active users, and others like Scruff and Jack’d, are designed to help gay men solicit sex, often anonymously, online. Today in Boston, two men can walk down the street holding hands without consequence.īut I’m worried by the rise of the underground digital bathhouse.
The Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage is a constitutional right. I can filter them by body type, sexual position (top, bottom, or versatile), and HIV status.Īs a gay psychiatrist who studies gender and sexuality, I’m thrilled with the huge strides we’ve made over the past decade to bring gay relationships into the mainstream. Scrolling down, I find 100 similar profiles within a one-mile radius of my apartment in Boston. He’s called “looking4now,” and his profile explains that he wants sex at his place as soon as possible. When I open the Grindr app on my smartphone, I see there’s a 26-year-old man with tanned abs just 200 feet away.