We've all heard of catfishing, which has become a well-known term ever since dating went digital, and even inspired a hit MTV show. But what is kittenfishing?

Kittenfishing is the newest online dating term to join the ranks of other popular dating phrases such as catfishing, ghosting, love bombing, benching and breadcrumbing.

Think of kittenfishing as catfishing’s baby sister — hence the "kitten" part.

Where catfishing can involve bold-faced lies, highly filtered content and even fake identities, kittenfishing typically involves little white lies someone employs to appear more attractive to prospects on dating apps.

According to Glamour, some examples of kittenfishing include:

  1. Tweaking your age or height.
  2. Hiding certain features that make you feel less confident.
  3. Using old photos where you appear much different (e.g. younger) than today.
  4. Glamorizing lifestyles, hobbies and interests to appear more exciting or attractive to a potential partner, even if they're not fully truthful.
  5. Embellishing job titles or making your career sound more impressive or important.

Kittenfishing is very popular on apps such as Instagram, where digital filters reign supreme and can make us appear slightly yet realistically different than our true selves.

It's also the dirty dating trend we are all likely guilty of doing at some point or another. (Who doesn’t want to slightly embellish how exciting our lives are?)

However, with all this in mind, be aware that lying in any capacity is probably not the best way to start a new relationship, even if the lies seem innocuous enough.

Stars Caught in Big Lies

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