It’s good news for dateless teens everywhere.

A new study by the University of Georgia found that teenagers who don’t date are less depressed and fared better or equal to their dating peers.

The study found that adolescents in middle and high school who were’t dating were far from awkward misanthropes, but had good social skills and low depression.

“The majority of teens have had some type of romantic experience by 15 to 17 years of age, or middle adolescence,” said Brooke Douglas, lead author of the study, which published last week in The Journal of School Health.

“This high frequency has led some researchers to suggest that dating during teenage years is a normative behavior. That is, adolescents who have a romantic relationship are therefore considered ‘on time’ in their psychological development.”

That led Douglas to wonder what it meant for teens who chose not to date.

“Does this mean that teens that don’t date are maladjusted in some way? That they are social misfits? Few studies had examined the characteristics of youth who do not date during the teenage years, and we decided we wanted to learn more,” she said.

For the study, Douglas and co-author Pamela Orpinas looked at how 594 10th grade students who reported having little or no dating over a seven-year period differed on emotional, interpersonal and adaptive skills from their peers that had dated more.

The study used data collected during a 2013 study led by Oprinas, which followed a group of students from grade 6 to 12 from school districts in Northeast Georgia.

Douglas and Oprinas’ study found that students in the low dating group had significantly higher teacher ratings of social skills and leadership, and lower ratings of depression compared to those who dated more.

Self-reported depression was significantly lower in the low dating group, “but suicidal ideations did not differ,” according to the study.

“In summary, we found that non-dating students are doing well and are simply following a different and healthy developmental trajectory than their dating peers,” said Orpinas.

Douglas added: “While the study refutes the notion of non-daters as social misfits, it also calls for health promotion interventions at schools and elsewhere to include non-dating as an option for normal, healthy development.”