Friendships Come And Go, But Researchers Find That At 29, You've Got The Best Of Both Worlds
Friends create a social foundation of connectivity for people of all ages, but a survey has found there’s a peak age to develop, keep, and pursue more friendships. Researchers from Genius Gluten Free, a UK-based food firm have found 29 is the golden age of friendship, a time when your social balancing act is at its peak.
At 29 years of age, people are likely to have an average of 80 friends, making it the most popular age of them all. After researchers surveyed 1,505 Britons, they found the average person has 64 friends, which is 30 percent lower than what 29-year-olds are holding onto. The age on the cusp of the big three zero comes at a time when people aptly juggle their old friendships from school, develop strong friendships at work, and have a long future ahead to pursue a treasure trove of more friendships.
It all has to do with the high-pressured environments we endure day in and day out of our workplace. We spend more hours in offices at this age and create more strongly developed friendships. The survey also concluded that people working in marketing have more friends at work, followed by chefs, servicemen and women, artists, designers, and human resources.
“We wanted to understand how friendships are born in the office and interestingly it appears that the long hours and high pressured situations we often find ourselves in at work with colleagues actually help us form strong friendships, said Lucinda Bruce-Gardyne, founder of Genius Gluten Free, according to The Independent. “So make sure you take the time to get to know your team, whether it’s at lunch or over a drink after work it’s one of the best ways to find support and learn something new.”
Despite the high-mingling age of 29-year-olds, a study conducted by British social networking website called Friends Reunited, have found 70 percent of their participants over the age of 40 felt they weren’t truly happy until they reached 33. Does that mean there’s a range of happiness right around the 30-year mark? Or does it not matter how many friends you have, because apparently they don’t make you happy until you shake some friends off in preparation for your pinnacle of happiness?
“The age of 33 is enough time to have shaken off childhood naiveté and the wild scheming of teenaged years without losing the energy and enthusiasm of youth,” psychologist Donna Dawson said in the survey’s findings. “By this age innocence has been lost, but our sense of reality is mixed with a strong sense of hope, a ‘can do’ spirit, and a healthy belief in our own talents and abilities.”