Abstract

Heterosexual dating practices have been studied extensively in the social sciences. Many of these studies have employed Simon and Gagnon’s scripting theory (1986) as their theoretical framework, finding that heterosexual dating norms have not changed since the 1950s (Laner & Ventrone, 2000). Among these studies, some have used dating advice as an empirical source of data, though they have remained focused on dating advice in the print media (e.g. Eaton & Rose, 2011; Rose & Frieze, 1993). There are no existing studies about dating advice on social media, and the present study proposes to address this gap in the literature, by conducting a qualitative case study of a sample of 30 videos from dating coach Matthew Hussey’s YouTube channel (Hussey, n.d.). By changing the dynamics of information production, distribution and consumption, social media has increased the flow of accessible information, and this thesis examines whether such a transformation has affected norms surrounding dating scripts. Drawing upon Jackson’s four dimensions of the social (2006a), I propose an analysis of the intersections of heteronormativity, mononormativity (Barker, Gill, & Harvey, 2018), and neoliberalism in Matthew Hussey’s dating advice videos. This research found that the dating scripts discussed in Hussey’s videos are akin to those described in previous studies. However, an unexpected finding of this project was the limitations of scripting theory in accounting for structural power relations.