Relationships that a person forms with friends are necessary for one’s social integration because, without social interaction with others and the formation of friendships, one would not have the social skills needed to navigate the world and those around them. We know that girls and boys have a tendency to gravitate, especially at a young age, to friends of the same sex or gender presentation. However, heterosexual cross-sex friendships are likely to raise questions about the possibility of platonic relationships. These kinds of friendships beg the question of whether strictly platonic cross-sex friendships are able to exist and be satisfactory for each participant. Along with the possibility of a healthy, platonic relationship, I want to explore what positive and negative effects cross-sex friendships have on those involved, and also what variables affect the maintenance of positive and satisfactory friendships of this sort.
To identify factors relating to the quality of cross-sex friendships, we can look at Cum Kwing Cheung and Catherine McBride-Chang’s article Relations of Gender, Gender-Related Personality Characteristics, and Dating Status to Adolescents’ Cross-Sex Friendship Quality. This article discusses how instrumentality and expressivity are involved in the perceived quality of cross-sex friendships among adolescents. We learned about these two terms in lectures and how men are more instrumental (assertive, dominating, and rational) and women are more expressive (more emphasis on relationships, expressing feelings, and sensitivity The authors hypothesized that, due to our society’s socialization of boys and girls, adolescent girls may be more likely than boys to seek emotional closeness with cross-sex friends and that girls would be able to gain the benefits of help and security from male friends. It could also be assumed that boys would seek out friendships with girls to obtain a greater sense of closeness than with same-sex friends. Gender can be seen here connecting to the perceived benefits and rewards one would receive from a cross-sex friend that would differ from the rewards of a same-sex friend.
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Participants in this study completed a questionnaire. To measure levels of expressivity and instrumentality participants were instructed to indicate on a 7-point Likert scale the extent to which 16 adjectives (8 relating strongly to instrumentality and 8 relating strongly to expressivity) best described them. To assess cross-sex friendship quality a version of the Friendship Qualities Scale was used by providing 23 questions relating to 5 different dimensions of friendship: companionship, closeness, help, security, and conflict (Cheung and McBride-Chang 60).
Results of this study showed partial support for the hypothesis that girls would report higher levels of companionship, closeness, help, security, and conflict in their cross-sex friendships over boys. The study found that compared to boys, girls only reported higher levels of help, security, and conflict. There didn’t appear to be significant gender differences in levels of companionship and closeness. Results for the hypotheses focused on instrumentality and expressivity found again only partial support. This study showed that instrumentality correlated to all five components of cross-sex friendship quality but expressivity was only a significant correlate of four, not including conflict (Cheung and McBride-Chang 65). Results of this study also contained some support for social role theory in that males tended to report more male-gendered expectations of instrumentality (strength and power) while females reported more female-gendered expectations of expressivity (help and security) (Cheung and McBride-Chang 66). Based on this study we can determine that parental investment as well as social role theory have an effect on the quality of cross-sex friendships in seeing that both instrumentality and expressivity correlated to both closeness and security among both genders in cross-sex friendships.
Michael Miller and Amanda Denes discuss parental investment and the socialization of perceived gender roles in their article Touch Attitudes in Cross-sex Friendships: We’re just friends. The idea from parental investment theory that men desire a number of mates in hopes of maximizing healthy offspring and women focus more on building a relationship with one mate who will provide care and protection may tell us more about differences in ways men and women form these friendships. They present their research in the form of an empirical literature review and findings from an online survey. In writing this review the authors hypothesized that male and female attitudes toward touch amongst cross-sex friends would vary in relation to parental investment theory.
This study collected data through an online survey. The research was gathered on two topics of cross-sex friendship touch: touch scales, and intimacy. Touch scales were measured using four of Brennan and colleagues’ seven scales of touch and these responses were used to determine participant’s attitudes toward different styles of touch (sexual, public, safe-haven touch) among cross-sex friends (Miller and Denes 315). Within the four scales, there were a number of questions (2-8) relating to each one and participants responded on a Likert scale of 1-7 to describe whether or not they agreed with the questions.
The findings of this study revealed that men have less desire for touch with women when they feel increasing intimacy, whereas women have more desire for touch with men along with the perceived increase in intimacy (Miller and Denes 318). This connects to ideas about parental investment in that men may retreat if they sense intimacy leading towards monogamy since the theory claims that men inherently desire multiple partners to facilitate a higher probability of offspring survival. Another supporting aspect of these findings in regard to parental investment theory is that men tend to be more aroused by touch in cross-sex friendships based on the theory’s emphasis on a male’s focus on mating with multiple partners (Miller and Denes 319).
In the article Relational Maintenance in Cross-Sex Friendships Characterized by Different Types of Romantic Intent by Laura K. Guerrero and Alana M. Chavez, the authors explore how romantic intention, biological sex, and uncertainty are associated with maintenance behavior in cross-sex friendships. In this study, college-age students were given a questionnaire that included different behaviors attributed to heterosexual cross-sex friendships (Guerrero and Chavez 344). These questions related to relational maintenance behaviors, friendship situations, relational uncertainty and sex, effects of friendship type, and associations between maintenance behavior and relational uncertainty.
The authors of this study concluded that compared to men, female respondents tended to report more emotional and instrumental support and positivity within cross-sex friendships (Guerrero and Chavez 348). Findings of this study support Cheung and McBride-Chang’s results relating to instrumentality and expressivity since females were more likely to receive more instrumental support from men and vice versa.
Heidi Reeder studied the impacts of gender role orientation on same and cross-sex friendship formation. In her article The Effect of Gender Role Orientation on Same and Cross-Sex Friendship Formation she found that gender role orientation does have an impact on cross-sex friendships. For the sake of my research, we will ignore her findings on same-sex friends, as I am only focused on the aspect of cross-sex friendships. She acknowledges that differently, gendered relationship rewards may have an effect on who can provide the most benefits for a specific gender.
The study on whether gender role orientation has an impact on the formation of same and cross-sex friendships was conducted by use of a questionnaire, consisting of several sections. The first used a version of the Bem Sex Role Inventory to measure traditional gender role orientation. The second part of the questionnaire assessed three variables: relative frequency of same and cross-sex friendship formation, preference for same or cross-sex friends, and closeness to same and cross-sex friends.
The results of this study found a correlation between gender role orientation and the inclination for cross-sex friendships. The study showed that more feminine people (either male or female) had a significantly higher percentage of female friends and that more masculine people had a higher percentage of male friends (Reeder 147). From these results, we can assume that feminine people seek out female friends and vice versa because people feel more comfortable engaging with someone with certain similarities. In class lectures, we learned about relationship rewards and Reeder relates this notion of rewards to cross-sex friendships saying that some people in cross-sex friendships believe that they gain greater benefits from these types of relationships over same-sex friendships. Connecting Reeder’s findings to Cheung and McBride-Chang’s theory of benefits and rewards, we can find similarities in cross-sex friendships gaining specific rewards from differently gendered individuals.
Reeder also found that gender role orientation affects the frequency in which individual forms cross-sex friendships and also that sex played a role in determining friendship closeness, noting that males and females alike tended to be closer to female friends. We could relate this to the socialization perspective since females tend to be higher in expressivity, both males and females find a greater sense of comfort among female friends. As Cheung and McBride-Chang pointed out, only females reported a sense of conflict within male friendships, therefore it can be assumed that overall, friendships with females tend to contain less conflict or negativity.
On the topic of platonic vs. romantic friendships, William Hart, John Adams, and Alexa Tullett from the University of Alabama conducted a study to determine the degree of platonic vs. intimate feelings within cross-sex friendships. The authors discuss multiple previous studies in which males and females share similar or varying beliefs regarding optimism for platonic cross-sex friendships. For their particular study, 418 undergrad students participated in the form of an online questionnaire, involving questions relating to perceptions of sexual interest within cross-sex friendships and whether males and females can “just be friends.”
Their results suggested that both males and females are similarly optimistic about the maintenance of a strictly platonic cross-sex friendship (Hart et al. 197). This study, like that of Cheung McBride-Chang and Reeder, determined that cross-sex friendships can appear to offer different benefits relating positively to instrumentality and expressivity (different perspectives, openness, security, closeness, etc.) (Hart et al. 197) and that oftentimes individuals would not want to complicate these types of benefits by involving the potentially complicated aspect of sexual intimacy. However, results did determine that 52% of respondents assumed that some aspect of cross-sex friendships involves sexual attraction (Hart et al. 198). This notion brings us again to parental investment, where either consciously or subconsciously, males and females seek out people of the opposite sex with the goal of expanding their genetic material.
Results from Cheung and McBride-Chang, Reeder, and Hart et al. all concluded that perceptions of benefits and rewards within cross-sex friendships help to formulate and maintain these types of relationships. In other words, people tend to seek out friendships with people they feel will offer some kind of specific benefit, for example, males offering security to females, and females offering the opportunity for more openness with males. Also relating to material from class lectures, perceptions of instrumentality and expressivity were a common theme throughout the discussion of cross-sex friendships. Hypotheses were supported with results demonstrating that both male-centered instrumentality and more female aspects of expressivity were both critical and also differently beneficial in certain circumstances between cross-sex friends. Theories of parental investment and social roles were identified in relation to cross-sex friends in that males and females have different approaches and needs when it comes to interacting with members of the opposite sex. These theories were supported by evidence of males remaining more open to sexual touch among cross-sex friends and females feeling more reserved and choosy about intimacy among male friends. In the lecture, we also discussed different perspectives, such as evolution and socialization, in relation to different topics. In regard to cross-sex friendships, these perspectives relate to the above-mentioned theories of how males and females respond differently to levels of intimacy among cross-sex friends.
In the 1998 film Living Out Loud, the characters Judith (Holly Hunter) and Pat (Danny DeVito) form an unlikely cross-sex friendship. It begins with both characters being lonely and sad, so they find mutual comfort in each other. However, as the movie progresses, one-sided romantic feelings arise on the part of Pat. He begins to develop more intimate feelings for Judith, who rejects his desire for intimacy. Pat’s forward expression of intimate feelings had a negative impact on their friendship. This movie was a good example of the delicate and complicated situation between heterosexual cross-sex friends.
Through these studies, we can identify a trend between the maintenance and quality of cross-sex friendships and expected gender norms. A common factor of cross-sex friendships was one of instrumentality and expressivity and the different benefits one can gain from having a friend who expresses more feminine or masculine qualities. Another notable factor was that of friendship rewards and benefits. Multiple studies concluded that one reason for the formation of cross-sex friendships is the perception of gaining different types of rewards based on the different gender of a friend. As these studies all had multiple research questions and hypotheses, it is difficult to narrow down to one specific conclusion about cross-sex friendships and we can clearly see the complexities that this type of relationship contains. However, we are able to determine that in some instances cross-sex friendships are capable of remaining platonic, and also that if mutual levels of intimacy were to arise, it could be to the benefit of the individuals within the friendship.
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