04/21/2009 1:00 am
Culture
The Art (and Science) of Women's Friendship, by Jeffrey Zaslow
Journalist and co-author of The Last Lecture Jeffrey Zaslow on the science behind why women are better at holding on to friends than men.
Amazon
I envy women and their friendships.
I envy the ease with which so many of them share their lives. I envy the vital ways they support each other emotionally. I envy how their bonds strengthen as they get older together. I am impressed by how a lot of them are able to get through their conflicts with each other and build stronger friendships as a result.
I say this as an outsider. I’m a man with a wife and three teenagers, all daughters. I have seen my girls pout and fret and cry over friendships in turmoil, and I have seen how their friends have buoyed them at their lowest moments. At times, their sweetest friends have turned into stereotypical mean girls. At other times, former mean girls turn into friends. As a parent witnessing it all, I often feel helpless and exasperated. But I get to see the bonds of female friendship at work.
Having observed how my mother, sister and wife built lovely friendships over the years, I naturally hope my daughters can be as fortunate. When I think about their futures, I want them to feel enveloped by people who love them, and I know they’ll need close loving friends at their sides.
And so, as a journalist, I’ve written columns over the years on female friendship – and I just spent two years working on a book about one particular group of women who’ve been friends all their lives. In the process, I’ve come to understand the great differences between men and women when it comes to friendship, and how women often have richer relationships.
Research shows that women are far better at holding on to old friends. Women who remain friends with each other into their 40s are almost certain to remain enmeshed for the rest of their lives. Men, on the other hand, build friendships until about age 30, and there’s a steady falloff after that. One reason: Male friendships are more likely to be hurt by geographical moves or differences in career trajectories.
Men connect through work, sports, politics. For years, I have played in a weekly poker game and we rarely talk about anything besides the betting and the bluffing. We almost never mention our wives, our children, our feelings. I wouldn’t be comfortable in some touchy-feely poker game — and I doubt one exists — but I have come to see the benefits of articulating love in a friendship.
Many women do that very well. They talk, share and touch each other. We men mostly just do things together. Researchers describe it this way: Women’s friendships are “face to face” while men’s friendships are “side by side.”
Close friendships – even more than close family ties – help prolong women’s lives. For women, old friends are like traveling companions, hitting the same milestones together – 30, 40, 50, 80. A host of studies show that having a close group of friends helps women sleep better, improve their immune systems, stave off dementia and actually live longer. In fact, researchers say a woman who wants to be healthier in her old age is better off having one close friend than a half-dozen grandchildren.
There was, for instance, a 14-year project at Flinders University in Australia that tracked 1,500 women as they aged. Many women in the study had meaningful relationships with children or other relatives; this didn’t appear to improve their survival rates. But those with the most friends outlived those with the least friends by 22 percent.
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An admission, Jeffrey: With a few exceptions, my closest friends are men. Thinking back, I believe the gravitational pull began around age 50 and has never ceased. As you tell us, men are expected to have "an image" — is "manly" a good word? Emotions have been repressed, tamped down. A wall has been erected with the "do not trespass" sign.
I don’t read warning signs. Early on - but over age 50 definitely - I found that men - once the wall is down (which I find easy) - crave that person they can trust to "talk". Their needs go far beyond sex at later ages, and perhaps, Jeffrey, I could write the book about my friendships with men and what I have learned … and how my own life has been enriched in so doing.
Do men talk to their wives? Some do — but, for some reason — it is easier to talk to a woman outside their inner realm. And - as in about anything in life - when you find a person fascinating and want to listen, using openings to widen conversation, men are not all that different. Truly.
Taking "men" another step further: face-to-face conversation against letters? I personally find that anything in print to anyone about personal things is pure confidence that the words will go no further. As we women know, it is often when we are alone that we have the need to "spill" — and who wants a phone call at all hours. And so we write … and so do men. I am still "being there", responding in kind — or just reading, listening, taking it in, and getting the larger picture on feelings that open things up further.
My husband? He calls me a magnet and believes - if I were a psychologist - all my clients would be restricted to men. Absolutely. . and if I were to guess, business would be flourishing. We all need someone(s) who care, isn’t that right? Oh - I left out "understand" and that is important, as we women know.
My women friendships back up to the time we were children — age 1 is my oldest and one of the dearest. But the bonds from childhood are a firm foundation for the closest adult women friendships for me — and I must lead the pack on "numbers" as I don’t believe in losing anyone that is near and dear to me… and the interchange is constant and deep.
Again — it is all in priorities. It is all in getting up at 4am to leave a message for a friend to wake up to — for it makes me happy. But we don’t really need to hear ourselves talk, do we? Listening carefully and well to men and women, getting beneath the words to the meaning, and "being there" always is my own JOY!
Maybe it’s just my age group, but I’ve found males to be more trustworthy as friends. Women tend to be catty, vicious, two-faced, judgmental, overly critical, gossip mongering B-words.
They may "hold on" to one another’s friendship better, but it’s rarely without some form of secret/hidden resentment(s).
Loved loved loved this book! As I have aged "gracefully" into my forties, I have discovered that there is no way that I could have survived all of my major life happenings without my core group of girlfriends. Many of them were either in the throes of the same issues; maturing children, taking care of grandparents and parents, major career interruptions and beginnings, failed romances, failed businesses - you name it we have seen it all and managed to pick ourselves back up again, over and over.
Thank goodnesss that I grew up and realized how precious those long-term, flexible friendships are.
Thanks, Jeffrey, for your insight. I wonder about women like me who put career first and had no children in our marriages. On the surface we would seem to have less in common with most other women with children.
For myself, I have three close female friends, all my age, but the 5 classmates I met at age 10, with whom I’ve sailed with everywhere, and to whom I share my deepest concerns [and visa versa] - these are my best friends - they are all men. I appreciate their candor and their ability to quickly assess a situation and develop solutions, something my female friends aren’t quite as adept at. But I must admit, when I want to discuss something creative the girls are definitely the ones I go to.
Yes, Joan Larsen’s comment really describes my experience of friends. And like her, I’ve found that as my male friends became secure in their professions, the more open they became in discussing topics with emotional content. Surprise, surprise, men have emotions, too!
I’m sure I lean more towards male friends because for so many years we’ve each respected one another’s struggles, achievements, and perseverance. That’s not to say that women are not cut from the same cloth - it’s just that they were busy having babies at the time when I was fighting a glass ceiling. Different struggles, different alliances.