Women aged over 50, for instance, tend to focus on finding a match who is ideally 6 years older than their own age.There is not much wiggle room in this instance: anyone more than 5 years younger is deemed too young.What is the acceptable minimum age for your own (and others’) dating partners?When this question comes up in conversation, someone inevitably cites the “half your age plus seven” rule.Men aged 60-69 set, on average, a desired partner age of up to 11 years younger than themselves, while the oldest they would accept is someone just 1 year older.But younger men buck the trend, with those aged up to 30 preferring to date someone older than younger.
People reported distinct age preferences for marriage; a serious relationship; falling in love; casual sex; and sexual fantasies. Based on the figures Buunk and colleagues (2000) provided (and thus the numbers are only informed approximations), I replotted their data superimposing the max and min age ranges defined by the half-your-age-plus-7 rule.Young men nowadays probably also recognise that older women are adept at diligently juggling so many responsibilities (career, children, housekeeping, fitness, finances, socialising), which makes them intriguing and attractive and a more secure option.’’ Women may not be so keen to play the ‘cougar’ though.The data from female users suggests that still women prefer to be the youngest in a relationship.This rules states that by dividing your own age by two and then adding seven you can find the age boundary: Take your age, subtract 7, and double it.So for a 24-year old, the upper age limit would be 34 (i.e., 17 * 2).