Tinder is bad for your mental health, say scientists
TINDER is bad for your mental health, scientists say.
Women who use the popular dating app are more likely to hate their bodies.
And blokes swiping for dates tend to have lower self-esteem.
An estimated 50m people worldwide use Tinder to find love.
They swipe right if they fancy someone, left if they don't.
If both people swipe right they are "matched" and able to contact each other through the free app.
But the latest study, presented at the American Psychological Association annual meeting in Denver, Colorado, suggests it can fuel psychological problems.
Mental health experts are already worried about overuse of the app.
Hungarian psychologists recently developed the Problematic Tinder Use Scale - specifically to measure levels of addiction.
The latest study, at the University of North Texas, involved almost 1,300 adults - mostly women.
One in ten said they regularly used Tinder.
When researchers quizzed them on body image, self-esteem and psychological well-being, they found some disturbing trends.
Men who used the app had lower self-esteem than those who didn't.
RELATED STORIES
And women users were more likely to be unhappy with their looks.
Researchers stressed they can't be sure Tinder caused psychological problems - or whether people with them were drawn to using it.
Dr Jessica Strübel said: "Being actively involved with Tinder was associated with body dissatisfaction and body shame.
"Men and women are equally and negatively affected."
Experts think using Tinder may make some people more aware of what they see as flaws in their looks and appearance.
Researchers at Queen Mary University in London recently found female Tinder users were ending up miserable because most men on the app have no intention of hooking up.
Instead, they are more likely to use it as an ego booster.
The research found women carefully chose matches - only swiping right when they saw men they really liked.
Fellas, on the other hand, tended to swipe right on all profiles just to see who 'liked' them.
The findings emerged after researchers set up 14 fake male and female Tinder profiles.