Document Type
Article
Publication Date
6-18-2015
Abstract
Friends play important roles throughout our lives by providing expressive, instrumental, and companionate support. We examined sexual orientation, gender, and age differences in the number of friends people can rely on for expressive, instrumental, and companionate support. Additionally, we examined the extent to which people relied on same-gender versus cross-gender friends for these types of support. Participants (N = 25,185) completed a survey via a popular news website. Sexual orientation differences in number of same-gender and cross-gender friends were generally small or non-existent, and satisfaction with friends was equally important to overall life satisfaction for all groups. However, the extent to which people’s friendship patterns demonstrated gender-based homophily varied by sexual orientation, gender, and age. Young adult gay and bisexual men, and to some extent bisexual women and older bisexual men, did not conform to gendered expectations that people affiliate primarily with their own gender.
Recommended Citation
Gillespie BJ, Frederick D, Harari L, & Grov C . (2015) Homophily, Close Friendship, and Life Satisfaction among Gay, Lesbian, Heterosexual, and Bisexual Men and Women. MPLoS ONE 10(6), e0128900. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0128900
Copyright
The authors
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Included in
Gender and Sexuality Commons, Social Psychology Commons, Social Psychology and Interaction Commons
Comments
This article was originally published in PLoS ONE, volume 10, issue 6, in 2015. DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0128900