Why Generation Z struggles to make and keep friendships

With an abundance of research backing the importance of friendship to our sense of belonging, wellbeing, health and happiness, there is no doubt that for the majority of us, these social connections are integral to our lives.

But for one generation, making friends hasn’t been so easy and it is having a lasting impact.

Research conducted by several institutions including Dartmouth College has found that Generation Z (those born between 1997-2012) are struggling to make friends and keep them.

At the root of this issue, the experts say, was the COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions enforced at the height of the pandemic, many of which prohibited or restricted working from the office or workplace and attending school or university in person, which significantly impacted Gen Z’s social circles as well as their social skills.

“During the pandemic, there was the lack of consistency,” said Joyce Chuinkam, senior research manager at Los Angeles-based market-research agency Talk Shoppe, which interviewed Millennials and Gen Z about their friendships during the pandemic.

While school and work had traditionally been “consistent shared experiences” for young adults in past generations, these organizations no longer served that purpose, she said.

“Many people, Gen Z specifically, who are entering the workforce, haven’t necessarily had the experience of being able to make friends in the typical way, and are starting a new job for the first time where they don’t know anyone,” Miriam Kirmayer, a clinical psychologist and friendship expert, told the BBC.

Relationships Australia NSW CEO Elisabeth Shaw also said we “often underestimate the social role workplaces play” in our lives.

“At certain stages of life [particularly as people transition from school into the workforce], a workplace can be critical to us socially,” she said.

“Post-school there are a lot of new norms to navigate. The ways one went about school won’t work at work. So that first job experience is as much about navigating ‘who am I now?’ and ‘how do I do this?’ This is more nerve-racking online, as you often need the chance to observe and experience that only comes with being in the office.

“For an early-stage career, watching how seniors carry themselves around the office, who is doing what at each desk, how long they stay, and what conversations can be progressed at the kettle, are all critical to becoming an effective employee.”

The flow-on effect from this absent in-person workplace interaction has meant that not only did Gen Z face a couple of years with little, or in some cases, no social networking at a formative time in their lives, but they also found that many social skills required to do so now, in the post-pandemic era, have simply not been formed.

Research conducted by Janice McCabe, an associate sociology professor at Dartmouth College between 2016 and 2021, has highlighted this “anti-social’ behavior”.

The study, which was conducted via a series of interviews over several years to track friendships of college students, found that the pandemic had negatively affected the ability of the participants to both sustain friendships and make new ones.

“Making new friends was really tough [during the pandemic], so networks across the board were shrinking,” she said.

Lilly, a 23-year-old who completed her university degree during the pandemic, identified with this, telling news.com.au that she almost forgot how to have a conversation with someone new.

“Completing my course remotely and speaking to minimal people face-to-face, predominantly family members for a good part of a year, really impacted my confidence and communication skills,” she said.

“Before the pandemic, I was extremely social and had no issues being in new environments with new people, so it was quite difficult trying to deal with the fact that I was struggling.”

Research conducted by Job Sage in 2022 has shown similar findings, with friendship dynamics changing due to hybrid and remote work settings.

“Nearly one in four Americans has a work friend they’ve never met in person, and as their workplaces inevitably change over time, it might be harder to hold onto those friendships,” Job Sage found.

“In fact, 82 percent have experienced friendships ending once they left the job.”

It also found that in-person employees were more likely (39 percent) to make the most of their friends at work, compared to fully remote employees (22 percent).

And friendships made in the workplace diminished with each generation – 40 percent of Baby Boomers have workplace friends, followed by Gen X (37 percent), Millennials (35 per cent) and Gen Z (24 percent).

The outcomes of this have wider and more serious implications, the study also found.

“Younger generations and remote workers are facing challenges making friends in remote environments, which threatens their happiness, productivity and creativity at work, not to mention their company loyalty,” it found.

The future for Gen Z’s friendships points to fostering alternative modes of meeting new people and maintaining these friendships, Chuinkam believes, including apps and social networking – with Bumble BFF and Facebook groups currently leading the way.