> In a set of interviews he did in 1994 with middle-aged Americans about their friendships, Rawlins wrote that, “an almost tangible irony permeated these adults

> In a set of interviews he did in 1994 with middle-aged Americans about their friendships, Rawlins wrote that, “an almost tangible irony permeated these adults discussions of close or ‘real’ friendship.” They defined friendship as “being there” for each other, but reported that they rarely had time to spend with their most valued friends... To what degree does friendship have to do with quantity of time spent, as "being there" suggests, versus quality of time spent? Anecdotally, it seems that people can share deliberately quality time, as determined by some arbitrary and subjective metric, and remain fulfilling friends with each other. It also seems that many conflate quality of time with quantity because spending lots of time with someone (or someones) will yield some moments of that formative quality. Does this observation break down after the social 20s, when people start families and move away? Have you found that raw amount of time spent with someone matters more or less as you grow older?