Male Bonds Form Differently, Women's Relationships Other. Is It Time to Halt Efforts to Make Men Into Women?

It's beneficial to talk. Or so men are often instructed, by everyone from mental health advocates to the women they live with. These women are bemused by the common male tendency to pass an entire evening in the pub with decades-old friends, yet come home with no insight about the personal struggles in each other's lives. What could they possibly be doing, all that time? How come they didn't they asked how X is coping with his breakup, or how Y is managing the loss of his father?

For women, whose own friendships often revolve around an deep and detailed understanding of each other's private feelings, this style of male intimacy—based on seemingly avoiding meaningful conversation—can seem oddly hollow and unfulfilling. It's no surprise, one might think, that more than 25% of British men state having no close friends; that male loneliness is endemic; that many refuse to visit a doctor until in dire straits; that male suicide rates repeatedly outstrip female ones; and that many middle-aged men, especially, seem permanently frustrated for unarticulated reasons. Bottling emotions up benefits no one.

Reconsidering the Value of Silent Companionship

Yet, according to anthropologist Thomas Yarrow, this view may sell short the strengths of the strong and quiet friendship. Professor Yarrow, from Durham University, was studying volunteers at a historic steam railway in northern England when he was impressed with the bond forged among these predominantly older men. His lengthy study has been distilled into a paper arguing that, particularly for men brought up in an era of the emotional restraint, the value of friendships built around shared hobbies—"shared activity, often in companionable silence"—may be underappreciated.

This muted form of friendship "isn't bad or outdated, it's just different," Yarrow states.

Granted, this can seem oddly similar to how toddlers play—alongside each other rather than directly with each other. But Yarrow's point is evident: simply due to the fact that it's not your ideal version of friendship doesn't mean it lacks value. Perhaps we should let these men in peace with their trains, golf, or vintage auto projects—whichever pursuit allows them to spend time in the company of others who also value less chatter.

Past Words: A Tacit Language of Concern

Fortunately, Yarrow is explicitly not arguing that expressing emotion is weak, nor calling for a return to the past. Instead, he highlights that emotionally expressive talk isn't for everyone, and that deeper things may be occurring beneath the surface of seemingly reserved friendships. Is he right?

As a woman's viewpoint, I'm clearly no expert on male-to-male conversation. But professional observation indicates that while men may be more reluctant initially to open up sensitive matters, once they do, they can be astonishingly forthright. A absence of visible emotion should not be equated with a absence of feeling entirely.

Additionally, while younger men raised in a more expressive culture may be better at voicing feelings, older men are far from unable of it. Repackage soft emotions as masculine "political opinions" or "team allegiance," and many men will happily vent anger, hope, disappointment, or satisfaction for hours.

The most striking about Yarrow's railway volunteers is that, for all their horror of discussing feelings, they still managed to express what looks remarkably like concern and affection. When an older volunteer was absent and later returned clearly unwell, his friends noticed and were concerned. But, as the professor notes, they deliberately didn't ask direct questions. Rather, they offered tea, told jokes, and tried to be subtly supportive while keeping normality. They were looking out for each other pretty much as female friends would, except without ever naming the obvious issue.

The Core Issue: Is Connection Need Words?

It's not the ideal way of bonding, and it may not be yours. But if the true beneficial value of friendship—the thing that combats loneliness and despair—is fundamentally knowing that someone is there enough to walk through life's difficulties with you, must that always be put into words?

The debate persists. Maybe the most constructive approach is to acknowledge that varied forms of friendship carry comparable value, each satisfying the psychological needs of various individuals in unique powerful way.