How do friendships develop? - Chapter 7

Why do people want to form friendships?

Our friendships are a source of joy and support. Close friendships are sincere and intimate relationships between people with affection, association and companionship. Friendships differ from our romantic relationships in the sense that they are less intimate and have less commitment. Friendships are characterized by several factors like  respect, trust, capitalization, social support and responsiveness.

• Within friendships, people respect each other. They value each other and hold the other in high regard.
• In a friendship, we have confidence that we will receive kind treatment from our friend.
• In a friendship, people respond with great energy and enthusiasm to the positive events in the other's life. In capitalization, we share our happiness and promote our enjoyment.
• Social support comes in many different forms in our friendships including affection, advice, and material support. Some friends give us more social support than other friends. The best support is the support that best fits our needs and preferences. Invisible support goes unnoticed by the recipient but can produce many positive outcomes. Perceptible support is nevertheless also extremely important. It is about how we ourselves perceive that we are supported by our friends. What we think our friends do for us matters in the long run. Our personal characteristics affect our perceptions of social support from our friends. 
• Responsiveness is about providing attention, support and recognition of our needs and interests. Perceived partner responsiveness is incredibly rewarding and encourages intimacy within a relationship, as does self-disclosure, trust and interdependence. There is invaluable value in receiving respect and understanding from our friend. 

Friendships have shared beliefs that offer rules about how friends should and should not treat each other. These rules and beliefs are culturally determined. 

How do friendships develop over the life course?

• During childhood, children grow up and mature. The friendships people form also become richer and more complex during childhood. However, the sophisticated ways in which adults shape their friendships are still very different from the friendships during childhood.
• During the teenage years, people become increasingly focused on their peers and relationships with them. This shift in focus is important for the fulfillment of attachment needs.
• During early adulthood, the number of friendships often decreases but the friendships people have become deeper and more intense.
• During middle age, dyadic withdrawal occurs, where people invest more and more of their time and energy in their romantic relationship and, as a result, the investment in their friendships decreases. 
• At a higher age, according to socioemotional selectivity theory seniors develop a preference for quality of friendships rather than quantity.

What are the differences between various types of friendships?

There are some gender-related differences between friendships where the individuals are the same gender. Friendships between women tend to have a high degree of emotional sharing and self-disclosure. Friendships between men tend to be more about shared activities, comradeship and competition. Research has shown that married partners are generally more satisfied with their relationship when they have common friends. Best friends are more intimate with each other than regular friends. Several aspects of intimacy are involved in this area, best friends share more knowledge, have more trust and are more dependent on each other for example. 

In addition, there are some individual differences in friendship. Most gays and lesbians have heterosexual friends, but most heterosexuals are unaware that they have gay or lesbian friends. Relational self-construals cause people to value their relationships and consider independence less important. People who score high on the Dark Triad traits like narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy are often manipulative and unemphatic in their friendships.

What difficulties can we encounter in friendships?

In a friendship, shyness can lead to difficulties. Shy people are worried about social disapproval and behave in a timid manner. They often have negative interpretations of the behavior of others and therefore try to avoid them as much as possible. Many shy people interact comfortably with others when they have an excuse for when things go wrong. Therefore, we can draw the conclusion that shy people benefit from more self-confidence rather than better social skills.
In addition, loneliness can lead to difficulties in forming friendships. Dissatisfaction and adversity take place when we want more and more satisfying connections with others, which can involve both social loneliness and emotional loneliness. Loneliness is the result of genetic influences like insecure attachments, low self-esteem and low expressiveness. It is associated with negative beliefs and poor interactions that are not interesting for others to engage in. Hopeful attributions and reasonable expectations can be helpful in getting rid of feelings of loneliness. Therefore, it is important to recognize these self-destructive beliefs when experiencing loneliness.