Can an app improve your relationship?
Millions of people use dating apps, but many need help when they actually embark on a relationship. The good news: There are apps to help turn romance Luddites into Lotharios.
There are thousands of apps that may improve couples’ relationships and sex lives. For couples who need help with the latter, there are apps that could teach couples new tricks, says Rick Singer, CEO of GreatApps.com, a site that reviews apps. But Singer says it’s worth approaching the subject of bringing an app into the bedroom cautiously. “I’m not sure that someone’s significant other wants to hear, ‘I downloaded this app so we can enjoy a better sex life,’” he says.
“It’s the latest instance of sex driving technology,” says Patchen Barss, author of “The Erotic Engine,” about the evolution of sexuality and technology. We’ve come a long way since the Victorian era, when gentleman carried X-rated Stanhope microphotographs in their pocket watches, he says.
And when it comes to improving couples’ relationships outside the bedroom, sometimes apps that have nothing to do with love or sex can provide incidental help: Daniel Hamermesh, professor of economics at The University of Texas at Austin, who has been married for five decades, uses CityMaps2Go ($1.99), an offline map and travel guide, when traveling with his wife, as well as IMDB’s free app for movie trivia. “They’re not designed to help your marriage per se, but they’ve saved us a lot of time and argument.”
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Others are skeptical about the usefulness of apps for couples. Carole Lieberman, a psychiatrist in Beverly Hills, says “apps are no substitute for real psychotherapy for relationship problems,” and adds that “there’s no quality control over the so-called love coaches who provide them.” And Joy Davidson, a psychotherapist and author, says, “I honestly can’t think of a single app that actually improves one’s sex life — except maybe Tinder — only because it might help you get a sex life if you don’t already have one.”
Moreover, most of the problems in relationships happen offline, says Nick Drydakis, a senior lecturer in economics at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge. In his own study — published by the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn, Germany — he found that sexual activity is negatively affected by issues like work-related stress, diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, cancer, and psychiatric and psychological symptoms, while it’s positively affected by good mood (extroverted personalities) and marital status (being married, despite widely held beliefs to the contrary) and growing up in a non-religious home.
Read also: Does Facebook break up marriages?
But for the technologically savvy, there is some assistance at hand. Here are five apps that could (maybe) improve your love life:
TheIceBreak
This iOS app has the kind of questionnaire you might find on dating apps, but offers daily questions for couples. They focus on a couple’s emotional and sex life: “Do you think it’s more important for a couple to be friends or lovers?” Others are more reminiscent of the questions asked on the TV show “The Newlywed Game” — for example, “What is ‘your song’ with your partner?” Others get to the point: “Can a romantic evening be complete without having sex?” Couples can also share photos and posts on their private virtual walls. It costs $1.99; some reviews complain about technical glitches.
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