Singlehood, Gender, and the Stories We Tell
By Jean-Ignace-Isidore Grandville, Courtesy of National Gallery of Art in Washington
More people are living single than ever before—it’s a global trend you can’t miss. In the United States, nearly half of adults were single in 2021, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Canada’s not far behind: in 2021, 53% of adults were not married, up from 49% in 2016, and nearly three in ten households are single-person—the highest share on record, according to Statistics Canada. Eurostat data shows that across Europe, a steady climb has brought single-person households to 35%. And in Japan, single-person households have jumped to 38%, while nearly three in ten men and almost one in five women hit age 50 without ever marrying—both record highs, according to the 2020 Population Census by the Statistics Bureau of Japan.
Meanwhile, social perceptions about singles can be rough. Singles are often seen as lonelier, less trustworthy, or even somehow “incomplete.” This prejudice, known as singlism, can have real-world consequences. For example, rental agents tend to seesingle tenants as more likely to be late on rent or cause trouble compared to married people. Yet despite the stereotypes, plenty of people are choosing singlehood. Between 2008 and 2021, surveys found that 23% of singles aged 18 and over scored either a 1 (“not at all”) or a 2 (“a little”) on a 5-point scale when asked how much they wanted a partner.
Singlehood may be rising almost everywhere, but the “why” and “how” vary widely. Culture, economics, and shifting norms all shape what it means to live single. And wrapped around these facts is a tangle of myths and half-truths about who singles are, why they stay single, and what their lives look like.
Some of the most persistent myths appear when gender enters the conversation. From how men and women are judged, to how they feel about their status, to the reasons they stay single, gender shapes the narrative in surprising ways. The truth is the research often tells a different story.
So here are three key questions about gender and living single—and the answers might just surprise you.
Are Single Women or Men Happier?
Popular culture has long clung to the idea that single women are destined for misery—the “miserable spinster” trope that turns up in films, sitcoms, and casual conversation. By contrast, single men are often framed as carefree bachelors, enjoying their freedom until they choose to settle down. These stereotypes influence not only how society views single people but also how singles themselves interpret their own happiness.
Reality doesn’t seem to have read the script.
A 2024 study pulled together data from 5,941 single adults across ten separate studies, ages 18 to 75, all single for at least six months. Researchers looked at four markers of well-being: satisfaction with relationship status, overall life satisfaction, sexual satisfaction, and desire for a partner.
Single women scored higher than single men on all three satisfaction measures—relationship status, life, and sex—and reported less desire for a partner. In other words, the “miserable single woman” trope doesn’t hold up, and if anything, it’s single men who seem less content.
This wasn’t just a fluke of age or background. Even after adjusting for age and ethnicity, the pattern held. Older single men, in particular, reported lower life and sexual satisfaction than older single women. Interestingly, when men and women were in relationships, their satisfaction levels were about the same, hinting that men’s lower scores may be specific to singlehood itself.
Why the difference? The researchers suggest a few reasons. Women tend to have stronger friendships and social networks outside of romance. They may also see fewer net benefits from heterosexual relationships, given ongoing imbalances in household labour and sexual fulfilment. With growing financial independence, the trade-offs of partnering can seem less appealing for women. Men, meanwhile, often rely more on a romantic partner for emotional and social support—so when they’re single, that loss can hit harder.
And this isn’t just a one-off finding. A 2020 study found the same pattern in both German and Polish samples: women scored higher on satisfaction with singlehood than men, regardless of cultural context.
The stereotype of the lonely, regretful single woman misses the mark, while the reality for many single men may be more complicated than the bachelor myth suggests. If anything, the data hints that women’s relative happiness in singlehood and men’s relative dissatisfaction may be reflections of the same underlying forces—how gender roles shape emotional support networks, influence expectations in relationships, and affect perceptions of gains or losses from partnering.
Do Women or Men Experience More Singlehood Discrimination?
If you spend any time on social media or hear personal stories, you might think single women take the brunt of the judgment: getting pity, unsolicited advice, or even outright criticism about their relationship status way more than men do. It’s a pretty common assumption that women face more “singlism,” that is, discrimination against singles. In fairness, plenty of single women say they feel judged more harshly than men. But the research paints a more nuanced picture.
A study published in 2024 explored whether single women and men experience different levels of discrimination and if the stereotypes about them differ. In two mixed-methods studies involving Canadian and American participants over age 36, both single women and men reported similar levels of discrimination. But there was a key difference: single women perceived higher discrimination toward single people in general—especially toward single women—than men did. Men, by contrast, tended to see discrimination as roughly equal toward both genders.
The authors note that this pattern—reporting less personal discrimination but perceiving higher discrimination against one’s group—is also found in other marginalized groups. They suggest it may function as a form of self-protection, helping individuals acknowledge societal bias without letting it erode their own self-esteem.
When it comes to the stereotypes themselves, the same study’s qualitative analysis revealed four recurring archetypes for both single men and women: the Professional (independent, hard-working), the Carefree (fun-loving, free-spirited), the Heartless (selfish, promiscuous), and the Loner (lonely, antisocial). While much of this content overlapped across genders, certain labels were uniquely applied to one group. Single women were sometimes tagged as “Cat Lady,” “frigid,” or “high maintenance.” Single men, meanwhile, were called “Mama’s Boy,” “slobby,” or “immature.” And then there were the especially negative gendered terms—men occasionally described as “incels” or “misogynists,” women as “bitter” or “picky.”
Another recent study offers a similar perspective from a different angle. The study found that singles—especially those single by choice for reasons society deems “unacceptable”—were often rated as less warm, less competent, lonelier, and more depressed than partnered individuals. Crucially, these judgments did not differ significantly by gender; male and female singles were perceived in much the same way on all these traits.
Taken together, the two studies suggest that men and women face singlism at comparable rates, but the stereotypes attached to them are flavoured by cultural gender norms. In other words, asking “who has it worse” misses the point. What matters is not just how often men and women encounter singlism, but the different shapes it takes. The stereotypes aimed at single women and single men aren’t identical; they’re shaped by cultural ideas about gender, which means the bias may feel different even if it happens just as often.
What Are Women’s and Men’s Reasons for Being Single?
Men’s singlehood is often explained by fear of commitment, immaturity, or a reluctance to “settle down.” Women’s, by contrast, is frequently linked to a deliberate choice for independence: embracing career, freedom, and self-reliance over relationships. In reality, neither stereotype captures the complex mix of reasons people give for staying single.
A study published in 2020 set out to see what really drives singlehood, surveying 648 American singles about 92 possible reasons they might be partner-free. Researchers then grouped these reasons into 18 factors across four themes: low capacity for courtship, freedom, constraints from previous relationships, and personal constraints.
Overall, the top answers—poor flirting skills, wanting personal freedom, fear of getting hurt, different priorities, and being too picky—were common to both men and women. But the gender differences were telling. Men were more likely to say they wanted to “flirt around,” weren’t the “family type,” or feared commitment. They also mentioned lacking achievements or financial resources as hurting their dating prospects. Women, on the other hand, were more likely to cite wanting to avoid getting hurt, feeling undesirable (often tied to weight concerns), or having limited opportunities to meet potential partners. Men scored higher on freedom-related reasons, while women scored higher on emotional safety– and past relationship–related reasons.
These patterns don’t line up neatly with the classic narratives—whether it’s the “career-focused woman” or the “commitment-phobic man.” For many, singlehood is a mix of practical barriers, self-perception, and personal priorities. And while men may face stereotypes about status, ambition, and maturity, women contend with judgments about attractiveness, emotional readiness, and selectiveness. Both sets of pressures are rooted in deep-seated gender norms—and both miss the full complexity of why people choose, or end up, living single.
Looking across how gender shows up in singlehood, the picture is more tangled—and more interesting—than the usual headlines suggest. Gender does matter, but rarely in the predictable ways we’re told. Men and women may run into singlism at similar rates, but the labels stuck to them tell different stories. Women, on average, report more satisfaction in singlehood than men—a twist that flips one of our oldest cultural myths on its head. And while both have diverse reasons for staying single, those reasons echo a mix of age-old instincts and modern-day gender scripts.
The cultural scripts shape how people see themselves, how others see them, and the choices they make. If we really want to understand the rise of single living, we need to look past the averages and the archetypes, and listen for the very human calculations underneath—about safety, freedom, identity, and connection. That’s where the real story of gender and singlehood lives, and it’s far more revealing than any stereotype.