Playing hard to get - Is it just mind games?

Your out on a Friday night after a hard week at work sitting at a singles bar in your new dress and feeling sexier than ever. Your discreetly scanning the room looking for the stand out guy of the night. Before you fully register, your eyes are locked in place with a man sitting across the room that looks immaculate and has the smile of a Hollywood movie star. You experience a fully charged surge of butterflies in your tummy as your attraction becomes evident.

You look away a split second later, having sent out the signal that you are most certainly interested in him. For most single women, this kind of initial gesture would squarely put the ball in his caught, hence the hunting begins.

Now that an initial attraction has been established, why doesn't the women simply stand up and introduce herself to the man she has singled out from the entire room. The most common answer to this question is that men will lose interest if she presents no challenge. He will not consider her worthy of his advances and his ego will not necessarily receive the kind of boost men are programmed to seek out.

However for this ritual of cat and mouse to begin, it is important for the women to send out a subtle signal, men are petrified of rejection. In a recent survey carried out by a leading men's magazine, more than 75 % of men claimed they would not approach a women at a bar or club unless there was a distinct gesture on the ladies part showing she is indeed interested and available.

Those men and women who will never be able to strike up the courage to engage a complete stranger in a flirtatious manner are turning to the internet for a more anonymous approach, and to build their confidence through chat rooms and online dating sites. Recent statistics sourced from an Australian online dating service claims that more than 55% of singles have engaged an online dating site.

The online dating world has seen a change in the behaviour of men being the traditional hunter, whereby women are increasingly taking the initiative. Women feel a sense of having more control over other peoples actions when socializing on the internet, removing yourself from an unpleasant situation is as easy as clicking on your mouse.