Kindness is nice: Dating survey says Singaporeans think kind is the ‘new sexy’

Forget about superficial seduction, apparently most Singaporeans are into kind-hearted souls now.

Women-forward dating app Bumble’s latest survey found that 85% of singles in Singapore think kindness is the most important quality in partners.

The majority (70%) of those surveyed are not willing to date someone who does not make time for them (43%), exhibits toxic behavior (34%), is emotionally unavailable (31%), or plays mind games (28%).

Instead, 81% said being kind beats physical attractiveness, with honesty (53%) and compassion (45%) being the top two defining characteristics of kindness in a relationship. A great partner is also someone who respects their personal space and boundaries (49%) and values equality in the relationship (43%), according to respondents.

“As Singaporeans embrace a new approach to dating marked by open-mindedness and authenticity, we want to encourage singles to leave any toxic behaviour or relationships in the past and focus on kindness throughout the dating experience,” Bumble’s APAC Communications Director Lucille McCart said in a news release.

With this data, Bumble pushed out a Kindness is Sexy campaign with local actor Glenn Yong who’ll show you how its latest feature Compliments encourages users to strike up more positive conversations.

Complimenting someone is one of the kindest things a person can do, according to the survey which was conducted in May with 500 participants from Singapore.

But when we did a quick survey, we found that while respondents agree that kindness is good to have, it might not be the only winning quality in a successful relationship.

“Perhaps the first step in getting to know someone is to be kind. However, being kind is not the only way to get to know your possible spouse. They can be kind at the beginning, but what if they have ulterior objectives, such as being a chekopek (creep)? Isn’t that terrifying?” Kathrina Koh told Coconuts today, adding that sharing common interests, making an effort to get to know you and unconditional love are the more sexy qualities to her.

Others think that kindness should be given and that having similar values and ideal personalities are the ones that will last.

“Kindness is the bare minimum! But personality and maybe similar tastes are important. In the end beauty fades but personality is forever,” Clara Lim wrote.

“For me, our values should be aligned – and we want the same thing. Also, personality is important because they can be kind but if they boring as hell, nah man,” Hafizah Jainal said.

But at the end of the day, it might actually just boil down to looks as it is the first thing most take notice of and is the most highlighted feature in dating apps today.

“We may THINK that’s what we’re looking for. But in reality, the first thing we judge off someone’s profile is how a person looks – that’s when you decide to swipe left or right in the first place,” a woman, who only wanted to be known as Diana, said.

What do you think? Does kindness conquer all for you?