Male Friendship

Why Having No Close Friends Will Kill You

All humans are driven by shared needs: the need for power, accomplishment, beauty, self-esteem, love, etc. These needs are universal and have been with us since the beginning of time. But over the past year something interesting has happened. There’s been a shift in how our society is prioritizing these needs. Our current decade isn't about the pursuit of money or power or even love. So what's it about? It’s about friendship. And not those Facebook friends of a friend of a friend, but honest to goodness male friends you share a deep connection with — the people who know what you’re thinking before you even think it.

By now it’s well researched and documented that the deeper your social connections, the longer and happier you live. Intimate social ties reduce our risk of disease by lowering blood pressure, heart rate and cholesterol. In one study, for example, researchers found that people who had no close friends increased their risk of death over a six-month period (yikes). In another study, those who had the strongest friendship ties over a nine-year period cut their risk of death by more than 60%.

True friendship is one of the reasons that people in the poorest nations aren’t any less happy than those in the richest of nations. They might not have Prada, but they do have an enviable set of best buds.

1. Male Friendship on the Decline

Friendship is also the reason women consistently outlive men in our modern society. Women also do better as widows than men, having spent their lifetimes prioritizing and building a rich support network of friends to rely on.

What about men? Research shows the number of true friends an adult male has has been steadily decreasing for decades. It seems once you guys leave college, and especially once you get married and have kids, true friends become a thing of the past.

Women’s approach to friendship is better. And new research indicates men are starting to notice. But the reasons women approach friendship differently isn’t biological; it’s historical.

Increasing mobility during the 20th century contributed to a decline in the quality and quantity of male friendships. Most men had to travel far and wide for work, which made it tough to create strong, lasting ties with anyone. Men got used to living without “friends of the heart” and instead passing their time with “friends of the road” — friends that are good for a laugh and a beer, but not much else.

2. Intimacy vs. Isolation

As the industrial revolution enabled more leisure time, men began to prioritize having more fun and friends in their life. But instead of basing friendships on stronger emotional bonds, male friendships were cemented around shared activities like bowling, golf or poker, activities that don’t necessitate intimacy. In research conducted by my company, Audience Theory, we discovered men in their 40s can play a regular poker game every Sunday afternoon for years and not be able to share one intimate detail about the other players.

This style of male friendship set the standard for the generations to follow. Boys model themselves after their fathers and so we have generations of men today who practice friendship just as their dads did. When boys are young, they prioritize best friends just like girls do, but as boys age, they lose sight of the value of sharing emotional bonds with other guys.

Hollywood’s caught on to this gap in the male friendship world. There are tons of movies that connect in part because they show a style of adult male friendship that’s super rare. But why should it be? In today’s modern society, where the pursuit of happiness is taking precedence, having a true buddy to take on the world with isn’t just fun and good for your health; it’s the latest trend.

3. Develop Meaningful Friendships

Prioritize friendship: That means calling your true buddy more than once a year and not spending that entire time on poop anecdotes (or maybe it’s just my husband that does this). A landmark UCLA study conducted in 2009 found only those committed to tending intimacy in friendships on a regular basis gained the long-term health benefits of close-knit ties.

Know the difference between “poker” buddies and true buddies: Poker buddies are fun, but they’re not going to lower your cholesterol level. Several studies conducted in three decades around male vs. female differences found that women’s friendships cover the spectrum of emotional needs. So women have their poker buddies, too, but not at the expense of other types of more intimate friendships.

Don’t count on your female partner to fulfill all your emotional needs: Multiple studies found that many men in marriage do an intriguing thing: They promote their wives to the role of sole confidant. It may sound counterintuitive, but psychologists consistently report that marriages are actually stronger when men have other men to turn to for advice and comfort.