Why We Need Intergenerational Friendship
When you are in elementary school, having friends from another class can be an indicator of your social status. Communication with children in the class below yours can be seen as a negative factor, but if you manage to communicate with older children, you must be doing something right. Interesting, considering that we’re only talking about a year or two age difference anyway.
When we are adults, it seems strange to limit our social circles to people born within a few years of us. In fact, most of us have likely made friends with people from completely different generations – and that’s a good thing, according to several studies. Here are some of the benefits of cross-generational friendships and why you are working to form your own friendships (if you haven’t already).
Friendship between generations is a learning opportunity
In a recent article for Inc. Jessica Stillman has reviewed research on intergenerational friendship and has found ample evidence that it is mutually beneficial. The most obvious benefit is that they give both people the opportunity to learn new things – from wisdom and understanding of the past to exploring new trends. This idea is supported by findings from the Graduate Center of Science at UC Berkeley , as well as 70 years of research on happiness at Harvard .
Intergenerational friendship makes us more resilient
With so much talked about the importance of sustainability over the past year, this advantage of intergenerational friendship is more relevant than ever. But how does it work? According to Stillman, “By offering you a much longer perspective, whatever your current difficulties, [friendship with the elderly] can make setbacks less disastrous and permanent.” In addition, being friends with young people can give you new perspectives on your problems.
The AARP study provides additional information:
A recent poll found that 61 percent of those with significantly older friends said intergenerational friendships helped them see different perspectives. 54% of those who had a younger friend said the same thing. About the same percentage in both groups (37 and 38 percent, respectively) said friendship helped them value their experience more.
Intergenerational friendship makes us more open
While our implicit biases don’t heal overnight, there are some things we can do to lessen them, and building friendships between generations is a good way to do this.
“Being around different people every day changes these hidden connections in our brains,” explained writer and researcher Rose Eveleth in a recent episode of NPR’s Life Kit podcast . “This means that the more you can diversify the people in your life, the more chances you will have to get rid of those hidden biases that you might not want to hold on to.”
Not to mention, public bias against older people is initially quite chaotic , given that we are all constantly aging and (ideally) ourselves will one day fall into this demographic. So be that kind of friend to the older (or younger) person you would ever want to have.