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I wonder how much of the lack of close friends is due to people moving more frequently. After college most of my close friends did a stint in various cities mak

I wonder how much of the lack of close friends is due to people moving more frequently. After college most of my close friends did a stint in various cities making it very difficult to maintain a relationship with them. I’d be curious to see a graph of reported close friendships against mobility.

Gigachad 4y ago
Along with low density car based transport. Used to live in the suburbs a few years ago and had very few social interactions because there was way too much friction. Easier to just play video games or watch TV. Now I live in a high rise and have a few friends in the same building. Social events are spontaneous, I'll get a message like "Hey we are having a party now, come down to level 5" so I end up spending a lot of time with friends and building social groups.
- c1ccccc1 4y ago
  I like this explanation and the one in the parent comment quite a bit. Rather than a grand thesis about internet / social media [0] / polarization that one's likely to see in a think-piece, it's the little things about how we've chosen to structure our society. These things that seem like trivial inconveniences [1], like just making some new friends when yours have moved away, or if you live the suburbs just taking that 20 minute drive whenever you want to see someone, end up having a disproportionate impact on our behaviour. After all, we evolved in an environment where one was pretty much automatically embedded in a community, with very little effort required to socialize other than following the social norms of the tribe. One other thing I'd also point to is network effects. If lots of people are all finding it easier to be online all the time rather than be social, then for any given person, that results in a reduced number of potential friends. [0] I would actually put some blame on social media for being a poor substitute for socialization, but just good enough that it makes people less likely to dig themselves out of being isolated. But blaming the internet in general, including things like blogs makes as little sense as blaming books. [1] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/reitXJgJXFzKpdKyd/beware-trivial-inconveniences https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/reitXJgJXFzKpdKyd/beware-tri...
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  That sounds pretty cool. Although is it common for people to make friends in the same building and hang out? Or are you super social compared to average? I am guessing you just chat to people in corridors?
  - jandrewrogers 4y ago
    Anecdotally, this is relatively common. You have a lot of incidental social contact with other residents unless you go out of your way to avoid it. I've met some pretty interesting people this way.
  - Gigachad 4y ago
    It kinda depends. For the first year I lived here I didn't know anyone else in the building but one existing friend moved in after me and then the owners corp set up some community events like a gardening club for the shared garden area that help. You do talk to people a bit in the corridors but honestly the vast majority of the time you enter or exit there will be no one in them and you might see a particular person leave at the same time as you once every few months. Even when I didn't know others in the building. My central location is right next to the main public transport hub which made it super easy for my existing friends to get in, and not worry about how they are getting home after drinking because its a 5 minute walk to the train station.
- bergenty 4y ago
  Having lived in apartments a lot, you one makes friends in those. I found it a lot easier to make friends in suburbs after meeting people in local bars.
  - jen20 4y ago
    Wow, if there are bars, your suburbs are quite different to the ones here! One of the primary reasons I refuse to live in anything that looks even a little bit like a suburb is because I want to have a choice of bars (I’d settle for one…) to walk to.
gernb 4y ago
I'm curious about this too. I moved 7000 miles from my home town without much thought. It was just exciting. I've been here 20 years. I can still contact my close friends from home but we connect only once every year or 2. I'm severely torn between my current country of residence and the fact that, counting the years, I'll only see my parents a few more times before they pass away given I only see them once every year to 2 as I live so far away. It often crosses my mind, I fully love the experiences I've had and the friends I made abroad but if I could do it over, I sometimes think, knowing what I know, I'd not choose to do it again. Sure, I'd give up those experiences and those friends but I'd have different experiences and different friends. My sister, who stayed put, clearly, by nearly anyone's definition, has had a full life of friends and family and achievements etc..., and she has none of the tradeoffs have having left loved ones behind and having to choose between them.
jackcosgrove 4y ago
Geographical mobility has declined as social trust has declined, so the correlation is the inverse of what you're describing. If anything the lack of social trust has made people more attached to their families and less willing to make a move. At least that's one explanation of the known mobility data.

Gigachad 4y ago

Along with low density car based transport. Used to live in the suburbs a few years ago and had very few social interactions because there was way too much friction. Easier to just play video games or watch TV. Now I live in a high rise and have a few friends in the same building. Social events are spontaneous, I'll get a message like "Hey we are having a party now, come down to level 5" so I end up spending a lot of time with friends and building social groups.

c1ccccc1 4y ago
I like this explanation and the one in the parent comment quite a bit. Rather than a grand thesis about internet / social media [0] / polarization that one's likely to see in a think-piece, it's the little things about how we've chosen to structure our society. These things that seem like trivial inconveniences [1], like just making some new friends when yours have moved away, or if you live the suburbs just taking that 20 minute drive whenever you want to see someone, end up having a disproportionate impact on our behaviour. After all, we evolved in an environment where one was pretty much automatically embedded in a community, with very little effort required to socialize other than following the social norms of the tribe. One other thing I'd also point to is network effects. If lots of people are all finding it easier to be online all the time rather than be social, then for any given person, that results in a reduced number of potential friends. [0] I would actually put some blame on social media for being a poor substitute for socialization, but just good enough that it makes people less likely to dig themselves out of being isolated. But blaming the internet in general, including things like blogs makes as little sense as blaming books. [1] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/reitXJgJXFzKpdKyd/beware-trivial-inconveniences https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/reitXJgJXFzKpdKyd/beware-tri...
quickthrower2 4y ago
That sounds pretty cool. Although is it common for people to make friends in the same building and hang out? Or are you super social compared to average? I am guessing you just chat to people in corridors?
- jandrewrogers 4y ago
  Anecdotally, this is relatively common. You have a lot of incidental social contact with other residents unless you go out of your way to avoid it. I've met some pretty interesting people this way.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  It kinda depends. For the first year I lived here I didn't know anyone else in the building but one existing friend moved in after me and then the owners corp set up some community events like a gardening club for the shared garden area that help. You do talk to people a bit in the corridors but honestly the vast majority of the time you enter or exit there will be no one in them and you might see a particular person leave at the same time as you once every few months. Even when I didn't know others in the building. My central location is right next to the main public transport hub which made it super easy for my existing friends to get in, and not worry about how they are getting home after drinking because its a 5 minute walk to the train station.
bergenty 4y ago
Having lived in apartments a lot, you one makes friends in those. I found it a lot easier to make friends in suburbs after meeting people in local bars.
- jen20 4y ago
  Wow, if there are bars, your suburbs are quite different to the ones here! One of the primary reasons I refuse to live in anything that looks even a little bit like a suburb is because I want to have a choice of bars (I’d settle for one…) to walk to.

gernb 4y ago

I'm curious about this too. I moved 7000 miles from my home town without much thought. It was just exciting. I've been here 20 years. I can still contact my close friends from home but we connect only once every year or 2. I'm severely torn between my current country of residence and the fact that, counting the years, I'll only see my parents a few more times before they pass away given I only see them once every year to 2 as I live so far away. It often crosses my mind, I fully love the experiences I've had and the friends I made abroad but if I could do it over, I sometimes think, knowing what I know, I'd not choose to do it again. Sure, I'd give up those experiences and those friends but I'd have different experiences and different friends. My sister, who stayed put, clearly, by nearly anyone's definition, has had a full life of friends and family and achievements etc..., and she has none of the tradeoffs have having left loved ones behind and having to choose between them.

jackcosgrove 4y ago

Geographical mobility has declined as social trust has declined, so the correlation is the inverse of what you're describing. If anything the lack of social trust has made people more attached to their families and less willing to make a move. At least that's one explanation of the known mobility data.