Washington, DC – Stagg, a next-generation, mobile dating app for gay men that launched recently on Dec. 20, released the results from a nationwide survey of 537 gay men showing even though the country moves closer toward legal recognition of same-sex relationships, gay men still face significant barriers to meeting potential partners and future husbands. However, the same national survey conducted by the new mobile dating app for gay men, also shows that apps are becoming increasingly important in the ability of gay men to connect to other single gay men for long-term romantic relationships.

Stagg’s national survey shows that two-thirds of gay guys who use mobile dating apps said they use them in the hopes of finding long-term potential. Stagg was designed partly in response to this survey, which underscores a pressing need in the mobile dating app market for users to be able to learn more than just the location of a potential match.

“The Supreme Court of the United States has announced they’d hear arguments in late March on two historic cases that could dramatically advance legal recognition of same-sex relationships,” said Brad Brenner, Ph.D., co-founder of Stagg and a licensed psychologist with a private practice in Washington, DC. “However, partly due to decades of stigmatization and discrimination faced by the LGBT community and, in particular, our romantic lives, gay men continue to find themselves too often wandering in bars, places of work, or online – our version of wandering in the wilderness – in search of potential long-term partners.”

Last week, The Huffington Post’s Gay Voices published an op-ed from Dr. Brenner on how the dating landscape for gay men has evolved politically, socially, and personally for many gay men. The full op-ed, including additional data from Stagg’s nationwide survey, is available here.

Highlights from Stagg’s culturally diverse, nationwide survey of 537 single gay men who ranged in age from 18 to 73, with an average age of 28 include:

App users search for a deeper connection

• 66 percent of the respondents said they use apps in the hopes of finding long-term potential, despite the almost universal perception that other guys on dating apps are looking for a hookup.
• 64 percent said that they use dating apps to find new friends.
• 16 percent of respondents — 1 in 6 men — choose dating apps as the most promising place to meet someone for long-term potential, a surprisingly substantial result given the reputation of first-generation dating apps for hookups.

Apps move dating away from computer screens and into public and social settings

• 56 percent of the respondents said that they use dating apps in public.
• More than one-third of all respondents, 37 percent, use the apps while with their friends.

Apps bridge communication and build connections

• 78 percent said that apps help them to start a conversation that they wouldn’t have otherwise initiated.
• More than one-third of respondents, 35 percent, said that apps are a way to have fun with their friends.

Stagg satisfies the urgent dating needs of gay men.

• 77 percent of the men said that when it comes to dating they don’t know where or how to find guys who are like themselves.
• 65 percent stated that breaking the ice and starting a conversation is a serious impediment to meeting guys.
• 56 percent said that dating apps are not friendly, when compared to dating websites.

An open-ended question put to these 537 men about what is most needed in apps revealed that they are seeking more substance in the type of information and potential connection than first-generation apps can deliver.