In studies of peer groups, Laura L. Carstensen, a psychology professor who is the director of the Stanford Center on Longevity in California, observed that people tended to interact with fewer people as they moved toward midlife, but that they grew closer to the friends they already had.
Basically, she suggests, this is because people have an internal alarm clock that goes off at big life events, like turning 30. It reminds them that time horizons are shrinking, so it is a point to pull back on exploration and concentrate on the here and now. “You tend to focus on what is most emotionally important to you,” she said, “so you’re not interested in going to that cocktail party, you’re interested in spending time with your kids.”
As external conditions change, it becomes tougher to meet the three conditions that sociologists since the 1950s have considered crucial to making close friends: proximity; repeated, unplanned interactions; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other, said Rebecca G. Adams, a professor of sociology and gerontology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. This is why so many people meet their lifelong friends in college, she added.
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Comments
Get off my lawn!
by Donal on Mon, 07/16/2012 - 1:31pm
Get out of my bar!
by PeraclesPlease on Mon, 07/16/2012 - 4:17pm
by cmaukonen on Mon, 07/16/2012 - 10:53pm
This is bullshit. I've made tonnes of on-line friends.
* crickets *
* really loud crickets *
* enormous numbers of incredibly loud crickets *
Anyway, fuck the Internet too then. I've still got beer.
by Qnonymous (not verified) on Mon, 07/16/2012 - 5:47pm
Free as in beer, not speech. Beautiful mural of the little Dutch boy there - must have been brave.
by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 07/17/2012 - 1:12am