comm 13
How can you successfully transition from friendship to romance, or back again?
Expect difference, emphasize disclosure, offer assurances
(T/F) Social media friends are automatically real friends
False
How can you better manage friendship betrayal when it occurs?
If it's a friendship of any closeness, expect to experience grief as you suffer the loss of trust, intimacy, and the image of your friend you once held dear
Which friendships tend to survive geographic distance, and which lapse?
In friendships that survive, the two people feel a particularly strong liking—affection and respect—for each other
Why do FWB relationships fail
Participants tend to develop romantic feelings despite their best efforts to avoid them, and many decide that the FWB relationship doesn't satisfy them enough emotionally
Challenges in building cross-sex relationships
People learn from early childhood to segregate themselves by sex and people often mistake the relationship for something more
10 friendship rules that people share across cultures
Show support Seek support Respect privacy Keep confidences Defend your friends Avoid public criticism Make your friends happy Manage jealousy Share humor Maintain equity
________ is the primary force that draws us to our friends
Similarity
interethnic friendship
a bond between people who share the same cultural background but who are of different ethnic groups
Many friends who develop an attraction opt to pursue
a romantic relationship
Friendship
a voluntary interpersonal relationship characterized by intimacy and liking
We consider most people in our lives ________
acquaintances
Physical separation prevents friends from
adequately satisfying the needs that form the foundation of their relationship
In the United States and Canada, men's friendships are thought to be
agentic
Most cross-sex friendships (are/are not) motivated by sexual attraction
are not
Agentic friends (are/aren't) interested in the emotional interdependence and mutual sharing of personal information
aren't
The most difficult barriers people face in forming interethnic friendships are
attributional and perceptual errors
Identity support
behaving in ways that convey understanding, acceptance, and support for a friend's valued social identities
Friendship facilitates a sense of _______ when we're young, and helps solidify our identity during adolescence
belonging
(Best/close) friendship involves greater intimacy, more disclosure, and deeper commitment than its counterpart
best
When we consider all the various friendships that arise and decay, two stand out from the rest as unique, challenging, and significant
best friends and cross-category friends
______ is the most commonly reported reason for ending a friendship
betrayal
Acts of friendship betrayal include
breaking confidences, backstabbing (criticizing a friend behind his or her back), spreading rumors or gossip, and lying
Companionship
chances to do fun things together and receive emotional support
Friends who overcome separation also accept ___ as a natural part of life and their relationship
change
The importance we attribute to our friendships (remains stable/changes) throughout our lives
changes
In the United States and Canada, for instance, friendships between women are often stereotyped as
communal
Your decisions regarding with whom you invest your time will often be perceived by friends as
communicating depth of loyalty
Studies of male friendships in North America have found that _______ is the primary need met by the relationship
companionship
Two of the most important functions that friendships serve are
companionship and helping achieve practical goals
With all this technology, people (fail/continue) to recognize the superiority of offline relationships and communication
continue
For straight men and women, forming a cross-orientation friendship can help
correct negative stereotypes about persons of other sexual orientations and the LGBTQ community as a whole
The four most common cross-category friendships are
cross-sex, cross-orientation, intercultural, and interethnic.
Similar to cross-orientation and intercultural friendships, interethnic friendships boost
cultural awareness and commitment to diversity
achieve practical goals
deal with problems or everyday tasks
Additionally, people prefer face-to-face interactions with friends when discussing
deeply personal or troubling topics
The defining characteristic of intercultural interactions is
difference
mental management
doing things to actively manage how you think about the other so that the attraction is diminished
Westerners believe that friendships (do/don't) endure
don't
But even more important than the actual sharing of activities is the perception that
each friend is willing to make time for the other
Friendship is an important source of
emotional security and self-esteem
Because friendships are rooted in liking—rather than love—we're not as
emotionally attached to as emotionally demanding of them
People who develop a close interethnic friendship become less prejudiced toward
ethnicities of all types as a result
The majority of FWB relationships (succeed/fail)
fail
Both men and women report that being able to ______ is the defining feature of friendship
freely and deeply disclose
We have greater liberty in choosing our _____ than we do in choosing partners for any other relationship type
friends
When asked to identify the closest relationship in their lives, Japanese tend to select
friends
For much of our lives, _____ are the most important close relationships we have
friendships
For the elderly, ______ are the most important relationships for providing social support and intimacy
friendships
cross-orientation friendship
friendships between lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, or queer (LGBTQ) people and straight men or women
Intercultural friendship
friendships between people from different cultures or countries
Agentic friendships
friendships in which the parties focus primarily on helping each other achieve practical goals
Cross-category friendships
friendships that cross demographic lines
Communal friendships
friendships that focus primarily on sharing time and activities together
Friendship beliefs and practices across cultures are also entangled with
gender norms
friendship rules
general principles that prescribe appropriate communication and behavior within friendship relationships
Moreover, friendships that survive separation involve friends who have a strong sense of shared ______
history
The principal reason straight men tend to make friends with other straight men is
homophobia, both personal and societal
Both men and women agree that through cross-sex friendships, they gain a greater understanding of
how members of the other sex think, feel, and behave
Research following friendships across a four-year time span found that more than any other factor participants who initially reported high levels of _______ from a new friend were more likely to describe that person as their best friend four years later
identity support
The most important factor that distinguishes best friends is unqualified provision of
identity support
Cross-category friendships are a powerful way to break down
ingroup and outgroup perceptions and purge people of negative stereotypes
Compared to family and work relationships, friendship interactions are the (most/least) task oriented
least
Friendships tend to revolve around _____ activities
leisure
Cross-orientation friendships are (more/less) frequent in real life
less
Cross-sex friendships are far (more/less) stable than same-sex friendships
less
(Women/Men) typically report more of a desire for romantic involvement with their platonic friends
men
Friends who seek to repress attraction typically engage in
mental management
People who regularly use cell phones to call and text their friends are (less/more) likely to also seek face-to-face encounters
more
People who were friends prior to a romance are much (more/less) likely to be friends following a failed romance than those who were not friends first
more
For LGBTQ persons, having a straight friend can provide
much-needed emotional and social support from outside the LGBTQ community, helping to further insulate them from societal homophobia
Studies comparing offline versus online friendships find that (online/offline) friendships have higher degrees of intimacy, understanding, interdependence, and commitment
offline
Intercultural friendship challenges
overcoming differences in language and cultural beliefs, as well as negative stereotypes
One of the most radical shifts in interpersonal relationship patterns over the past few decades has been the increase in
platonic (nonsexual) friendships between men and women in the United States and Canada
The strongest predictor of whether someone will have an intercultural friendship is
prior intercultural friendships
As with romantic and family relationships, it's important to balance openness in self-disclosure with
protection
Communication technologies have caused people to forge friendships (quicker/slower)
quicker and with more people
Similar to romantic betrayal, friends who are betrayed experience an overwhelming sense of
relationship devaluation and loss
Friends negotiate communicative boundaries that allow their time together and communication shared to
remain positive
Friends cope with attraction by doing one of three things
repressing, developing a romantic involvement, or making a friends-with-benefits arrangement
One of the strongest predictors of whether or not a friendship can successfully transition to romance is simply whether the friends already possess
romantic beliefs that link friendship with love
When asked to identify the closest relationship in their lives, Euro-Americans tend to select ______
romantic partners
Most partners in FWB relationships develop ___ regarding emotional attachment, communication, and sex
rules
Best friends are typically (same-sex/cross-sex)
same-sex
Friends provide essential emotional ______
security
Best friendship is distinct from close friendship in the degree to which
shared activities commit the friends to each other in substantial ways
One of the most common reasons for friendships ending is a change in
shared interests and beliefs (Miller et al., 2007).
Two important ways you can maintain your friendships are
sharing activities and being open in your communication with your friends
By far, the group that has the fewest cross-orientation friendships is
straight men
The first and most powerful cue of attraction is a radical increase in
the amount of time the friends spend flirting with each other
Valued social identities
the aspects of your public self that you deem the most important in defining who you are
friends-with-benefits" (FWB) relationship
the participants engage in sexual activity, but not with the purpose of transforming the relationship into a romantic attachment
Whether a friendship forms is determined largely by
the people involved, based on their mutual desire to create such a relationship
Those who form FWB relationships do so for two reasons
they welcome the lack of commitment (and all its attendant sacrifices), and they want to satisfy sexual needs
Agentic friends value sharing time together—but only if
they're available and have no other priorities at the moment
Friends who feel attracted to each other typically report high _____ as a result
uncertainty (regarding both the nature of their relationship and whether or not their friend feels the same way)
Characteristics of friendship
voluntary, driven by shared interests, self-disclosure, rooted in liking, and volatile