Gender differences in friendship patterns

The same-sex and opposite-sex friendship patterns of men and women students from two first-year psychology classes at the University of Waikato in New Zealand were examined. A friendship questionnaire previously used in the United States of America was administered to compare results of the two cultures. Findings from this study support American research suggesting that women are more intimate and emotional in their same-sex friendships than men, and tend to place a higher value on these friendships than men do. In accordance with findings of the American sample, New Zealand women emphasized talking, emotional sharing, and discussing personal problems with their same-sex friends, and men showed an emphasis on sharing activities and doing things with their men friends. Differences between the American and New Zealand samples were shown for men in the number of friends and the intimacy levels of these friendships. New Zealand men preferred numerous but less intimate same-sex friends, while women (as in the United States) showed a preference for a few, close, intimate same-sex friends. Men, in contrast to women, derived emotional support and therapeutic value more from their opposite-sex relationships than their same-sex friendships. Finally, more men than women stated they would not cancel an engagement with an opposite-sex friend in order to go out with a same-sex friend. Results are interpreted as suggesting a need for changes in the current socialization process of males who are taught to repress their emotions and form rather less intimate and possibly less beneficial same-sex friendships than women.     

多元视角下的异性友谊

异性友谊是一种重要的人际关系。已有研究考察了一般异性友谊的特点、影响和维系, 同时也考察了利友关系的心理特征和身心影响。异性朋友可能会对青少年和大学生的社会适应带来消极影响, 但这一影响可能具有文化差异。进化心理学取向的研究者主要考察了异性友谊的进化功能, 他们认为异性友谊能够帮助个体完成长期择偶目标或短期择偶目标, 同时还能够为个体提供重要的择偶信息。未来研究有必要结合新出现的友谊理论, 考察不同年龄阶段的异性友谊, 同时关注异性友谊中的个体差异变量, 比如人际性行为取向、暗黑三合一性格和择偶智力。     

未来配偶偏爱的特征——选择长期配偶与短期配偶的条件

该研究中被试分配有限“配偶币”来抉择与理想配偶标准相符合的性交往对象。首先,该研究重复验证了Li 等人 (2002) 和Kenrick (2006)的发现,男性理想的长期配偶需要外表出众,而女性理想的长期配偶需要社会地位较高;两性理想的短期配偶都必须外表出众。其次,两性所投射出的理想自我与潜在配偶偏好的特征一致,研究发现,长期性交往条件下,男性需要具有较高社会地位,女性需要外表出众;短期性交往条件下,男性和女性都需要外表出众。评价潜在配偶的机制与评价现有配偶的机制可能是两种受到选择的不同的心理机制。     

Beyond Similarities: Cross-Gender and Cross-Orientation Best Friendship in a Sample of Sexual Minority and Heterosexual Young Adults

The research investigates differences between heterosexual (n?=?714) and lesbian and gay men (n?=?386) young adults regarding best friendship patterns, well-being, and social anxiety. Based on data from a paper-pencil survey of 1,100 Italian young adults aged 18 to 26, this study underlines the importance of the best friend in young adults’ psychological adjustment, highlighting patterns of friendship in heterosexual and lesbian and gay men young adults. Overall, the majority of participants declared that they had best friends; in the total sample, significant differences were found between women and men, and between lesbian/gay men participants and heterosexual young adults. Lesbian and gay men participants reported more cross-gender best friendships than heterosexual participants did, as well as more cross-orientation best friendships. Gender differences were found only with regards to cross-gender friendships: gay men reported more cross-gender friendships than lesbians did, while heterosexual females reported a higher percentage of cross-gender best friendship than heterosexual males did. MANOVA analysis, only in the gay and lesbian sample, showed the effect of gender, cross-gender, and cross-orientation on well-being and social anxiety. For the well-being dimension, gay men participants with female best friends reported higher scores. In terms of social anxiety, lesbian and gay young adults with cross-gender and cross-orientation best friends reported lower levels of social anxiety.     

Poaching,promiscuity, and deceit: Combatting mating rivalry in same‐sex friendships

If humans faced recurrently over evolutionary history the adaptive problem of competition with same‐sex friends for mates, they may have evolved psychological mechanisms designed to prevent and combat mating rivalry with same‐sex friends. Four studies were conducted to test hypotheses about the design of these mechanisms. In Studies 1 and 2 (N= 406 and N= 342, respectively) we found that, as predicted, people experience more upset in response to imagined rivalry from a friend than from a stranger. In Study 3 (N= 455), in which a between‐subjects design was utilized, we found that women's, but not men's, willingness to become friends with a member of the same sex is lower when the person is described as sexually promiscuous. In Study 4 (N= 169) we found that people report being deceived by friends about mating rivalry more often than they themselves report engaging in deceit about rivalry, and women more than men deceive each other about how sexually experienced and promiscuous they are. Discussion addresses implications of the findings and the use of an evolutionary approach for understanding conflict in same‐sex friendship.     

Gender Rules: Same- and Cross-Gender Friendships Norms

We examined the relationships between gender and attitudes towards same- and cross-gender friendship norms for a sample of 269 West Coast, U.S., college students. Participants evaluated violations of friendship norms described in vignettes in which the friend’s gender was experimentally manipulated. Women differentiated more between types of violations in their evaluations than did men. There also were several significant gender differences in approval of norm violations. As expected, women tended to have relatively high expectations of their friendships in situations involving trust and intimacy, likely resulting from the high value they placed on affiliation and emotional closeness. Women were more disapproving than men of a friend who canceled plans or failed to come to their defense publicly. Men and women judged a woman who betrayed a secret more harshly than a man. Generally, expectations for cross-gender, versus same-gender, friends were more similar than different; there were no significant cross-gender interactions, with one exception. Men were particularly less approving of a male, as compared to a female, friend who kissed them in a greeting. Furthermore, an overwhelming majority of respondents (81.6%) reported that men and women can be friends. A minority of women were cautious in their responses, with women (18.5%) more apt to reply “maybe,” than men (9.9%). Overall, these findings provided evidence that gender, rather than cross-gender, norms primarily influenced friendship evaluations, and demonstrated that even a subtle manipulation of gender can trigger gender stereotypes. They suggested, too, that women may hold their friends to stricter “rules” than men.     

The Effect of Gender Role Orientation on Same- and Cross-Sex Friendship Formation

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of gender role orientation on factors related to same- and cross-sex friendship formation. Participants (N = 278) completed a version of the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Each participant listed their closest friends, the sex of each friend, and the closeness level of each relationship. They also indicated whether they prefer same- or cross-sex friendship. The results suggest that gender role orientation affects inclination for cross-sex friendship, particularly the relative frequency of cross-sex friendship. Feminine men had a significantly higher proportion of cross-sex friendships than did masculine men, and masculine women had a significantly higher proportion of cross-sex friendships than did feminine women. A significant number of participants indicated that they did not prefer one sex or the other for friendship. Gender role orientation had no impact on levels of closeness in either same- or cross-sex friendship.     

Misperceptions of opposite-sex preferences for thinness and muscularity

Thin and muscular have been characterized as ideals for women and men, respectively. Little research has investigated whether men and women have accurate perceptions of opposite-sex preferences of thinness and muscularity. Further, no study has explored whether opposite-sex perceptions of thinness and muscularity preferences differ for short-term and long-term relationships. The present study set out to address these questions. We used interactive 3D human models to represent bodies varying in size (body mass index/BMI weight scaled by height) and body composition. University-aged (18–31) White European heterosexual men and women were asked to choose their own and ideal body shape, the ideal body shape for a short- and a long-term partner, and the body shape they thought the opposite-sex would most like for short- and long-term partners. Women overestimated the thinness that men prefer in a partner and men overestimated the heaviness and muscularity that women prefer in a partner. These misperceptions were more exaggerated for short-term relationships than for long-term relationships. The results illustrate the importance of investigating misperceptions of opposite-sex preferences and raise the possibility that correcting misperceptions might have utility in reducing body dissatisfaction or eating disorders.     

Selective attention to signs of success: social dominance and early stage interpersonal perception

Results from two experiments suggest that observers selectively attend to male, but not female, targets displaying signs of social dominance. Participants overestimated the frequency of dominant men in rapidly presented stimulus arrays (Study 1) and visually fixated on dominant men in an eyetracking experiment (Study 2). When viewing female targets, participants attended to signs of physical attractiveness rather than social dominance. Findings fit with evolutionary models of mating, which imply that dominance and physical attractiveness sometimes tend to be prioritized preferentially in judgments of men versus women, respectively. Findings suggest that sex differences in human mating are observed not only at the level of overt mating preferences and choices but also at early stages of interpersonal perception. This research demonstrates the utility of examining early-in-the-stream social cognition through the functionalist lens of adaptive thinking.     

Can men and women be just friends?

We tested evolution‐based hypotheses about (1) sex differences in perceived benefits and costs of opposite‐sex friendship and (2) differences in perceived benefits of same‐sex friendships and opposite‐sex friendships. In the Preliminary Study (N= 400), an act nomination procedure was used to identify the benefits and costs of same‐sex friendships and opposite‐sex friendships. In Study 1, a total of 231 participants (100 men, 131 women) evaluated the frequency of occurrence of 100 benefits and costs in their closest same‐sex friendship or opposite‐sex friendship. In Study 2, a total of 229 participants (92 men, 137 women) evaluated how beneficial and how costly each would be if it were to occur in their closest same‐sex friendship or opposite‐sex friendship. Results supported several key hypotheses. Men perceived sex with their opposite‐sex friends as more beneficial than did women. Women reported receiving protection from their opposite‐sex friends more often than did men, and they perceived the protection as highly beneficial. Both men and women reported receiving information from opposite‐sex friends about how to attract mates, and they perceived this information as beneficial. The discussion focuses on whether these benefits reflect an evolved psychology of opposite‐sex friendship, or instead are incidental by‐products.     

The effect of attractiveness on food sharing preferences in human mating markets

The current study explored how physical attractiveness affects food sharing by studying payment preferences for hypothetical romantic dinner dates (a hypothetical mating market). We analyzed payment preferences, self-rated attractiveness, and rated attractiveness for hypothetical dates in 416 participants. We hypothesized that (1) men would be more likely to prefer to pay than would women, (2) attractive individuals of both sexes would be less willing to pay, and (3) preferences to enter an exchange would be influenced by the attractiveness of prospective partners such that (3a) men would prefer to pay for attractive women, and (3b) women would prefer to be paid for by attractive men. All hypotheses were supported by our results. Individuals with higher self-rated attractiveness were more likely to prefer that their date would pay for the meal, and we found clear sex differences in how the attractiveness of potential dates affected payment preferences. Male participants preferred to pay for dates that had higher facial attractiveness, while female participants preferred that attractive men would pay. Individuals show condition dependent financial preferences consistent with the provisioning hypothesis in this mating market that are adaptive to evaluations of their own quality and that of prospective partners.     

Women’s Close Friendships across Sexual Orientation: A Comparative Analysis of Lesbian-Heterosexual and Bisexual-Heterosexual Women’s Friendships

Interviews were conducted in close friendship pairs with women who ranged in age from 18 to 52 years at the time of interview. Results suggest that women of different sexual orientation identities had different friendship profiles. Comparisons across friendship type suggest that bisexual-heterosexual friends consistently experienced a shift in friendship dynamic based on the sex of partner for the bisexual friend and were more likely than lesbian-heterosexual friends to integrate their friendship into their social lives. Lesbian-heterosexual friendships were significantly more likely to include an explicit acknowledgment of non-heterosexual identity. Although cross-orientation friendships did not consistently include a feminist/political dimension, when friends also differed in racial identity a feminist/political dimension in the friendship became apparent. In cross-race friendships racial minority identities were explicitly acknowledged even when non-heterosexual identities were not.     

Helping New Acquaintances Make the Right Impression: Balancing Image Concerns of Others and Self

People strategically regulate information about the identities of friends to help those friends create desired impressions on audiences. Are people willing to help acquaintances manage their impressions, and if so, are such efforts moderated by the helper's own self-presentational concerns? Participants were 234 same-sex strangers who went through a structured self-disclosure procedure designed to induce psychological closeness. They later described this partner to an opposite-sex third party who supposedly preferred either extraverts or introverts as ideal dates, and who their partner regarded as attractive and wanted to impress or as unattractive and did not care to impress. As predicted, participants described their partners consistently with the preferences of the attractive other, but only when their own self-presentational concerns about accuracy were low. If the third party was unattractive, participants whose accuracy concerns were low tended to describe their partners opposite the preferences of the other, suggesting they were “not your type.” The results indicated that beneficial impression management occurs even among acquaintances, but is held in check by self-presentational concerns about accuracy.     

Friendships of older men and women: exchange patterns and satisfaction

In this study we examined the relation between perceived equity of exchanges and friendship satisfaction for a sample of 110 older men and women. Respondents were interviewed concerning their relationship with their best friend and one other friend in their support network. Perceived equity was a significant predictor of friendship satisfaction only in the case of the other friend. In addition, results showed that men were involved in more equitable friendships than were women. Discussion focuses on the importance of equity consideration and gender differences in the friendships of older adults.     

The Relationship Between Friendship Quality and Self-Esteem in Adolescent Girls and Boys

Much has been written about the low self-esteem of adolescent girls relative to adolescent boys, but little research has explored the role that friendship quality may play in affecting self-esteem. Ninety-seven female and 67 male 11th and 12th graders completed measures of self-esteem and of friendship quality with both same- and cross-gender best friends. Ninety-five percent of the participants were White, and ranged across the socioeconomic spectrum with the majority coming from middle-class families. We found that girls' self-esteem was significantly lower than boys' self-esteem and that girls rated their relationships as stronger, more interpersonally rewarding, and more stressful than boys did. Boys reported that their friendship with their best female friend was more interpersonally rewarding than their friendship with their best male friend, whereas girls rated the quality of their same- and cross-gender friends similarly. As expected, girls' self-esteem was positively correlated with the friendship quality of their cross-gender best friend. However, their self-esteem was not correlated with the quality of their same-gender friendship. Boys' self-esteem did not correlate with the quality of their same- or cross-gender best friendship. Results may help us understand the relatively low self-esteem experienced by adolescent girls.     

Perception of intensity of sperm competition on the part of males

Preferences for certain pornographic themes are hypothesized to have been influenced by our evolutionary history, where sperm competition could play a significant role. The mating system in our australopithecine ancestors, as well as in modern human societies, however, suggests that polygyny (characterized by low risk of sperm competition) has predominated over multi-male multi-female mating systems where high sperm competition is expected. In this study, a sample of men (N = 96) was investigated for their preferences for sexually explicit material showing low (sexual interaction with three women), moderate (one man and one woman) and high intensity of sperm competition (one woman and two men). The participants showed a strong and highly consistent preference for pictures showing moderate and low intensity of sperm competition. These preferences were not influenced by sociosexuality, pornography consumption or attitudes toward pornography. It is suggested that these preferences may mirror psychological adaptations for sperm competition which are activated when the risk of cuckoldry is high. Certain circumstances, where preferences for cues associated with high intensity of sperm competition would be adaptive, are discussed.     

Direct and Indirect Aggression: Relationships as Social Context

The studies reported in this paper examined the effect of social context—target gender and target relationship—on reports of direct and indirect aggression. In Study 1, participants completed the Richardson Conflict Response Questionnaire (RCRQ; Richardson & Green, 2003 ), which measured their direct and indirect aggression behavior in response to anger. Participants also selected a relationship partner to complete the RCRQ with reference to their own (i.e., participants') behavior. In Study 2, participants completed the RCRQ with reference to their behavior in response to anger with a romantic partner, a same-sex friend, and an opposite-sex friend. In both studies, relationship with aggression target was an important determinant of aggression, with more direct aggression occurring in romantic relationships, and more indirect aggression occurring in friendship relationships.     

POWER AND THE QUALITY OF SAME-SEX FRIENDSHIPS

Does the quality of same-sex friendship depend on the gender of the friends and the balance of power between friends? Fifty-four men and 60 women undergraduates evaluated two of their same-sex friendships, one equal in power and one unequal in power. The quality of each friendship was rated in terms of emotional closeness, satisfaction, liking, self-disclosure, and rewards. In general, most young adults evaluated their friendships positively. Mixed-model multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVAs) found significant main effects of gender and power on ratings of quality, but no interactions. Consistent with previous research, women generally evaluated their same-sex friendships more positively than did men. Gender differences were relatively small in magnitude and were not found for all indices of relationship quality, however. As predicted, participants rated equal-power friendships significantly higher than unequal-power friendships on all measures of quality. Power appears to be an important but largely neglected element of friendship.