Designing for Relational Stability: A Regulatory Framework for Matching Platforms

Dating applications and social networking platforms designed for romantic connection have become primary infrastructure for relationship formation in contemporary societies. Yet these platforms are designed to maximize engagement and user acquisition, not relational stability. This paper applies relational stability theory—drawing on Relational Emergence Systems (RES), Landau-Stuart dynamics, and Dunbar's number—to analyze how current platform designs systematically violate conditions for stable relationship formation. Six conditions for relational stability are identified: public knowledge, sufficient contact maintenance, ongoing multilateral consent, intimate circle limits, gradual transitions, and explicit articulation of purpose. Current matching platforms violate all six conditions. The paper proposes a regulatory framework—the "Relational Formation Platform Regulation"—that requires platforms to implement design features supporting stability conditions. Specific requirements include relationship status disclosure, partner consent verification for coupled users, purpose matching, simultaneous connection limits, staged interaction processes, and liability for misrepresentation. This framework treats matching platforms as social infrastructure with externalities requiring regulation, analogous to financial or environmental regulation.