We know almost nothing about how dating differs for older adults compared with earlier in life, a scientific conference on love has heard. But despite a lack of data, there are reasons to believe dating in later life is becoming increasingly common, and researchers are now starting to study how romance changes among the over-50s.

“There’s a massive dearth of information,” says Mairi Macleod, who runs Dating Evolved, a programme that helps women aged over 50 find partners. “But it’s really important that over-50s have good relationships; we still want to have sex and all the rest of it,” she says.

Why older dating may be on the up

There are several reasons why dating in the over-50s is thought to be increasing, says Macleod, who co-presented a talk at the Love, actually and in theory conference in Edinburgh, UK, on 5 May. One is that this age group is growing – in the UK, for instance, the number of over-50s increased by 3.1 million people in the 10 years to 2025, and this trend is set to continue over the next two decades.

Divorce rates among older adults are also rising in the UK and other Western nations such as the US, meaning more people over 50 are single, says Macleod, who married her second husband in her 50s. What’s more, it is becoming more socially acceptable to re-partner after a bereavement or relationship breakdown, she says.

A focus on young people

Yet research on dating is almost entirely focused on university undergraduates, who are easy to survey, and people in their 20s and 30s, meaning we know almost nothing about dating after we turn 50, says Craig Roberts at the University of Stirling in the UK, who co-presented the talk.

One reason why later-life dating is so poorly understood is that people tend to view love as a means for reproduction, which generally occurs before age 50, says Divine Charura, a psychologist at York St John University in the UK. Our 20s to 40s are also life stages where people are most economically productive. “It’s capitalism in some ways,” he says. “There is more funding available for studying early, working-age years.”

Society also tends to underestimate the romantic lives of older people. “If I say romantic love, you’re not going to think of my 92-year-old patient who still talks to me about her sexuality and romance meeting someone, and having wild sex,” says Charura.

The pros and cons of dating in later life

Macleod has set up a dating programme for heterosexual women over 50 in the UK, who may find it harder to find partners than older men. “There’s a shortage of men with increasing age after about 50,” she says. “Men just don’t live as long, and more men than women seem to be looking for a younger partner than themselves.”

This means that, with age, women are increasingly competing for a shrinking pool of men their age. “[Anecdotally] men are always in short supply in speed-dating events. A lot of times these have to be cancelled because not enough men turn up,” she says.

So far, Macleod’s programme has provided dating support – via weekly group calls, for six months – to over 200 women. She has gained insights on how dating differs in later life – at least for wealthy, highly educated women in the UK, she says. “There are advantages to dating later in life, things like not having a ticking biological clock and being financially independent,” says Macleod.

“Older women are better able to pick and choose. They generally decide not to have a bloke at all if they can’t find what they deem as a decent one,” she says.

Next, Macleod and Roberts are planning a study that looks at the challenges of dating in later life and identifies practical tips for older singletons.