- Malak Kalaz
1.0: Introduction
It can all start with one friendship, where you think you’ve found a friend that you would have all your life. Now, while this friendship could go about a million different ways, you believe that you’ve found the one ride or die person. Overall, friendships play a crucial role in shaping our mental and physical well-being. The positive features of good friends include supportive help, trust, encouragement, and a reduced amount of stress around them. A good relationship enhances emotional resilience, offering a sense of belonging, while bad friends bring in anxiety, depression, and physiological problems. The stress related to these toxic friendships weakens your immunity and harms your self-esteem, increasing your vulnerability to mental sickness. Understanding how friendships affect our overall health will help us in building positive friendships and avoid those that can cause harm.
1.1: Statistics
Now, it's quite logical thinking that a better mental health status directly correlates with better friends. We know that having good friends, or people you feel happy and at your best-self around, will have a positive impact on your mental health in the long run. According to a research article on the association of aggression with friendship quality, results show that only participants who had low-quality friendships with a person showed signs of aggression and vengeful coping. (Bowker et al., 2007) This supports the logical theory that having bad friends
won’t support, and even possibly harm, your mental health compared to loving, positive friendships. Additionally, studies reveal that people with strong social connections are less likely to develop mental health issues compared to those with fewer or weaker friendships, highlighting the crucial role of positive peer relationships in maintaining emotional well-being (Hojjat & Moyer, 2017). In Adkins (2021), a study highlighted that individuals with strong friendships report a 40% decrease in the likelihood of experiencing depression and anxiety compared to those without close social connections. This statistic underscores the significant mental health benefits of maintaining supportive friendships.
1.2: Mental Impacts of Good Friends
Good friendships have a profound positive impact on mental health, acting as a key to your emotional support and resilience. Research indicates that close, supportive friends can significantly rescue feelings of loneliness, anxiety, and depression by providing a sense of belonging and security (Adkins, 2021). These relationships foster an environment where individuals feel understood, valued, and accepted, which enhances self-esteem and emotional well-being. According to “The differential importance of friend, relative and partner relationships for the mental health of young adults”, friendships can be more influential than family or romantic relationships in affecting mental health, especially for young adults, by offering a source of relief and ways of coping with stress (McLaughlin et al., 2002). Bowker et al. (2007) extended this by suggesting that quality friendships can serve as protective factors in both helping against the negative effects of aggression and encouraging more adaptive social behaviors. Basically, good friends allow a no-judgement zone for emotions to flow, validation, and encouragement,, which in turn provides better mental resilience and, on the whole,
happiness. (Hojjat & Moyer, 2017) Such positive interactions enable an individual to navigate through life’s challenges, thus fostering better mental health outcomes.
1.3: Mental Impacts of Bad Friends
Bad friendships powerfully influence mental health through increased stress, anxiety, and lowered self-esteem. Toxic behaviors involving manipulation, aggression, or constant criticism may make an emotionally unsafe environment that will only enhance feelings of isolation and insecurity. (McLaughlin et. al., 2002) Such friendships usually create a vicious circle of emotional problems in which one feels unsupported or misunderstood. Besides, its emphasized in The Psychology of Friendship that toxic friendships undermine personal growth because it is rather difficult for people to develop positive ways of coping and dealing with adversities in their lives. In other words, bad friends can create a cycle of emotional turmoil and negativity, thus making it more challenging for individuals to maintain good mental health and cope effectively with life’s challenges.
1.4: Physical Impacts
Good friendships can have positive physical impacts by reducing stress, which lowers the risk of stress-related health issues like high blood pressure and heart disease (Adkins, 2021). Additionally, supportive friendships encourage healthier lifestyle choices, such as increased physical activity and better sleep, which contribute to overall physical well-being (McLaughlin et al., 2002). On the other hand, bad friendships can cause physical strain with chronic stress that may lower immunity and, hence, make one prone to illnesses (Bowker et al. 2007). It may also
lead to disturbed sleep, poor eating habits, and neglect of exercise, which can adversely affect the physical well-being of the individual (Hojjat & Moyer, 2017).
References:
● Adkins, I. (2021). Mental Health and the Impact of Friendship. WRIT: Journal of First-Year Writing, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.25035/writ.04.01.04
● McLaughlin, J., Horwitz, A.V. and Raskin White, H. (2002). The differential importance of friend, relative and partner relationships for the mental health of young adults", Levy, J.A. and Pescosolido, B.A. (Ed.) Social Networks and Health (Advances in Medical Sociology, Vol. 8), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 223-246. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1057-6290(02)80028-6
● Bowker, J. C., Rubin, K. H., Rose-Krasnor, L., & Booth-LaForce, C. (2007). Good friendships, bad friends: Friendship factors as moderators of the relation between aggression and social information processing. European Journal of Developmental Psychology, 4(4), 415–434. https://doi.org/10.1080/17405620701632069
● Hojjat, M., & Moyer, A. (2017). The Psychology of Friendship. Oxford University Press.
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