Ah, men. We love red meat. Wear tool belts. Cuddle with each other after a long hard day at work. Wait, what? Yep, turns out that in a British study released last March in the journal Men and Masculinities (yes, there are journals for everything) 98 percent of the heterosexual men interviewed had shared a bed with another guy, and 93 percent of them had cuddled or spooned with one.

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“We knew they [straight males] were hugging and cuddling, and we wanted to understand this phenomenon in more detail,” Mark McCormack, the study’s co-author, told the Huffington Post.

Why all of the bromance all of a sudden? McCormack went on to tell HuffPo:

“There is a generational effect here: Older men who grew up in the 1980s may still feel the need to present a very straight version of themselves, but more positive attitudes toward homosexuality in contemporary culture mean that younger men are simply less concerned about how other people view their behaviors.”

McCormack and fellow sociologist Eric Anderson conducted in-depth interviews with 40 young male athletes recruited from Anderson’s sociology of sports class. Of the 40, 37 said to have participated in some cuddle action. Here’s two students, Jarrett and Max describing what cuddling means to them:

Without being prompted, Jarrett repeatedly stressed the amount of cuddling he and his mates engage in. ‘‘We’re always cuddling, my lot. We’re all comfortable with each other.’’ Others highlight that cuddling occurs during the day and will often be described as ‘‘a quick cuddle.’’ John praised these short interactions, saying ‘‘I love a quick cuddle, just so you remember your friends are about and are there for you.’’

Also, cuddling is better than Advil:

On the morning following a night out clubbing, the friends will congregate at one house, where they watch TV, play video games. … These activities would include frequent cuddling, which Max described as ‘‘feeling good,’’ adding, ‘‘If your mate has a headache you can like massage his head, or you just lie there together holding each other and laughing about how awful you feel.’’

Have we entered the golden age of the bromance? Perhaps. But you don’t need Science ™ to tell you it’s ok to spoon your fellow man. Didn’t stop James Franco: