There's No Touchy-Feely in the Bromance

Feelings, schmeelings; dudes just want to hang
By Jane Yager,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 7, 2010 5:32 AM CDT
There's No Touchy-Feely in the Bromance
Male friends doing, not feeling, in the movie Wedding Crashers.   (New Line/Everett Collection)

Mark Leonard has played on a softball team with the same pals since 1978. And when he and his teammates get together, "our conversations deal with the doing of things rather than the feeling of things," Leonard says. His experience mirrors what researchers say about gender differences in friendship: "Women's friendships are face to face: They talk, cry together, share secrets. Men's friendships are side by side: We play golf. We go to football games," Jeffrey Zaslow writes in the Wall Street Journal.

But it's a mistake to think the lack of feelings talk makes men's friendships less deep or genuine, Zaslow says. Though they may not be emotionally expressive, men still draw a lot of support from their friendships, and many prefer to open up to their wives or female friends or family members about emotional issues. (More friendship stories.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X