A couple of years ago one of my friends introduced me to a rather interesting research project that his friend Matt had preformed. Matt had decided to take pictures of his then girl friend and post them up on a popular online dating site. He then wrote a profile for her – creating in effect what he felt was the perfect girl: Chrissy Parker. Chrissy was basically described as being nice, fun, down to earth, smart and obtainable. Matt wanted to see the kind of responses he’d get from guys on the site. Pictures are important, but how important is the content itself, and would that effect the responses that he received? And what kinds of letters do guys typically write to girls on these kind of sites?

About two weeks ago I had a chance to talk to Matt and asked him about the site. He laughed about it upon remembering it’s conception. He also mentioned that once he started reading the letters he felt kind of bad. I don’t think he was expecting the guys who wrote her to be so nice. He said they sounded like the type of guys he’d want Chrissy to date. His girl friend apparently also found this project interesting and read through the letters herself, though it’s unknown what she thought of them. According to Matt she wasn’t anything like the profile he posted up, and instead of being 22, she’s really 16 or 17 in the pictures that were displayed.

Anyway, if you’re interested in seeing a copy of the profile and letters that were received, you can find them in a nice little write up at the following link:

The Stupendous Chrissy Parker Project

Reading over it again it seems a little unethical, but it’s a neat idea.