Adult friendships
Researchers have uncovered three broad themes that underlie adult friendships. The most frequently mentioned is the affective or emotional basis of friendship. This includes self-disclosure and sociability and compatibility: Our friends keep us entertained and are sources of amusement, fun and recreation. Older adults, even those who live alone, have some friends and acquaintances to whom they can turn in emergencies. Although contact with friends tends to decline with age, the majority of older adults have at least one close friend with whom they are in frequent contact with. In fact, older persons who have kin may turn more to friends and neighbours for immediate assistance than to family, in part because friendship involves more voluntary and reciprocal exchanges between equals, consistent with social exchange theory. To the extent that friendships can satisfy social and material needs, and allow for reciprocity in relationships, they can compensate for the absence of a partner and can help ease a sense of loneliness.
Women tend to have formed more friendships--and closer friendships--throughout life. For many men their wives are their only confidant, a circumstance that may make widowhood devastating for them. In contrast, women tend to satisfy their needs for intimacy throughout their lives by establishing close friendships with other women and therefore are less dependent emotionally on the marital relationship. When faced with widowhood, divorce or separation, they can turn to these friends. Accordingly, widowed older women tend to receive more help and emotional support from friends than married older women. The resilience of some older women, in fact, may be rooted in their ability to form close reciprocal friendships. It is also found that married women will have less male friends.
Researchers have uncovered three broad themes that underlie adult friendships. The most frequently mentioned is the affective or emotional basis of friendship. This includes self-disclosure and sociability and compatibility: Our friends keep us entertained and are sources of amusement, fun and recreation. Older adults, even those who live alone, have some friends and acquaintances to whom they can turn in emergencies. Although contact with friends tends to decline with age, the majority of older adults have at least one close friend with whom they are in frequent contact with. In fact, older persons who have kin may turn more to friends and neighbours for immediate assistance than to family, in part because friendship involves more voluntary and reciprocal exchanges between equals, consistent with social exchange theory. To the extent that friendships can satisfy social and material needs, and allow for reciprocity in relationships, they can compensate for the absence of a partner and can help ease a sense of loneliness.
Women tend to have formed more friendships--and closer friendships--throughout life. For many men their wives are their only confidant, a circumstance that may make widowhood devastating for them. In contrast, women tend to satisfy their needs for intimacy throughout their lives by establishing close friendships with other women and therefore are less dependent emotionally on the marital relationship. When faced with widowhood, divorce or separation, they can turn to these friends. Accordingly, widowed older women tend to receive more help and emotional support from friends than married older women. The resilience of some older women, in fact, may be rooted in their ability to form close reciprocal friendships. It is also found that married women will have less male friends.
