Brooke Douglas, a lead author of the study, stated that the majority of teenagers have had some type of romantic experience between the ages of 15 to 17. Because of the fact that this percentage is so high, it has been considered by some scientists to be normative behavior for adolescents to date at this age.

Following that line of thought, researchers wondered what the impact was of choosing not to date during those adolescent years in comparison to those that did engage in romantic dating.

The researchers found that adolescents that were not engaged in romantic relationships during their time at middle school and or high school fared at least as good, or even better than peers that did date during that time.

In order to find out, data collected for a 2013 study was analyzed. For that particular study, teens were followed from their sixth to twelfth grade. Teachers filled out questionnaires where they rated the behavior of each student in domains that included leadership, depression, and social skills. It turned out that non-dating / rarely dating students had equal to better interpersonal abilities than their more regularly dating peers.