SNAP: the teen dating app

A discussion on social media and teen dating.

story by: kareem dadkhah

Snapchat is one of the most popular social media applications for teenagers. In fact, it has 106.2 million active users from the US 48% of those users between 15 and 25 years old. The platform was created in 2011 by two Stanford students who felt emoticons weren’t sufficient enough in conveying accurate emotion.

Unlike Instagram and Facebook, which center on entertainment, Snapchat is used for casual communication. You can quickly send photos and videos, called Snaps, and text messages, called chats (that disappear unless saved, which cause notification), without any clutter of message history like with e-mail and instant messaging. This makes the platform quite palatable to teenagers.

“I feel like people don’t like text as much because Snapchats more casual,” senior Aaron Fulks said.

Because of its widespread popularity and use, there is quite a lot of overlap between Snapchat and the modern teen dating experience.

“It’s definitely different than old fashioned dating would be, where you go out on dates, and you call people on the phone,”junior Emma Ward Said. “To some extent, I think that it’s entirely bizarre”.

Snapchat includes a feature called “Quick Add”. This feature provides the user with a list of other users that they can add with the click of a button based on their location, mutual Snap friends and digital contact list.

“People use the Quick Add feature which is very open so people usually just add random

“Not always, but it’s typical to Snap somebody before you start talking to them.” girls and like text them ‘Hey’, or ‘what’s up’,” senior Ahmed Bakur said. “It kind of starts off from there. You also have a public story. So you’re almost like advertising yourself.”

Sometimes Snapping can happen without any words at all.

“I think it’s so normalized to talk to strangers on Snapchat that it almost mimics a dating app for teenagers,” senior Emma Swartz said.

There is variability in how Snapchat is used.

“I would say some people would use it as a dating app, but not all of them. It’s also a way for people to stay connected, just as friends and like to know what everybody’s doing. Stuff like that,” Burris said.

Snapchat like many other social media apps, has its dangers.

It isn’t atypical at all to be Snapping with complete strangers. It also isn’t unheard of for romantic relationships to be sought after on Snapchat.

“A lot of relationships will start off by Snapping somebody,” senior Syrai Burris said.

“It’s bad because there are older people who prey on younger kids,” Fulks said. “They’re taking advantage of them.”

Senior Sally Foley shares simlar opinions to Fulks.

“You could add someone and then they could be a catfish, a person who’s pretending to be somebody else, usually it’s older people pretending to be younger,” said Foley, “but that’s the same with any dating app.”

Whether or not your Snapchat use is casual or romantic, it is important to be safe and smart.