Dating and mate selection

All of the principles discussed in this chapter applied to how my wife and I met, became friends, and chose to marry. Propenquity is the geographic closeness experienced by potential dates and mates.It’s the proximity you might experience by: living in the same dorms or apartment buildings; going to the same university or college; working in the same place of employment; or belonging to the same religious group.

Figure 1 shows the basic date and mate selection principles that play into our filtering processes (This inverted pyramid metaphorically represents a filter that a liquid might be poured through to refine it; IE: coffee filter).

I often ask my students how they met and when they tell their stories I help them to identify the geography that was involved in the process.

Physical appearance is subjective and is defined differently for each individual.

That couple in the bottom right-hand corner is my wife and I on a field trip to the Association for Applied and Clinical Sociology in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

She and I travel without our children at least twice per year and we have been attending professional conferences together for more than a decade. I was the maintenance man for all of the Women’s dorms and she lived in the dorms (I met many female friends through my work).