Male Connections Develop One Way, Women's Relationships Other. Ought We Cease Attempting to Push Men Into Women?

It's good to talk. Or so men are repeatedly advised, from sources ranging from mental health advocates to the women they live with. These women are puzzled by the typical male habit to spend an entire evening in the pub with longstanding friends, yet come home with no insight about the significant events in each other's lives. What could they possibly be doing, all that while? How come they didn't they asked how X is handling his breakup, or how Y is managing the loss of his father?

For women, whose own friendships typically center on an deep and encyclopaedic understanding of each other's innermost feelings, this style of male closeness—built on apparently sidestepping serious conversation—can appear oddly hollow and sad. It's no surprise, one might think, that more than 25% of UK men state having no close friends; that male loneliness is endemic; that many refuse to see a doctor until seriously ill; that male suicide rates consistently exceed female ones; and that countless middle-aged men, in particular, appear chronically frustrated for unspoken reasons. Bottling everything up helps nobody.

Reconsidering the Merit of Quiet Companionship

Yet, as per researcher Thomas Yarrow, this perspective may undervalue the strengths of the resilient and silent friendship. Professor Yarrow, based at Durham University, was studying volunteers at a heritage steam railway in the north of England when he was impressed with the closeness forged among these predominantly older men. His four-year study has been distilled into a paper arguing that, particularly for men brought up in an era of the stiff upper lip, the worth of friendships built around shared activities—"doing things together, often in companionable silence"—may be underappreciated.

This muted form of friendship "is not deficient or anachronistic, it's just different," Yarrow states.

Granted, this can seem oddly similar to how young children play—alongside each other rather than engaging with each other. But Yarrow's argument is clear: simply due to the fact that it's not your preferred idea of friendship doesn't mean it lacks significance. Perhaps we should leave these men in peace with their trains, golf, or vintage auto projects—whichever activity allows them to spend time in the presence of others who likewise value less chatter.

Beyond Verbal Expression: The Unspoken Dialect of Care

Thankfully, Yarrow is explicitly not claiming that expressing emotion is weak, nor calling for a return to the past. Rather, he highlights that touchy-feely talk is not for everyone, and that more may be happening beneath the surface of seemingly reserved friendships. Could he be right?

From a female viewpoint, I'm clearly no expert on male-to-male conversation. But professional experience indicates that while men may be more reluctant at first to open up personal matters, once they do, they can be astonishingly candid. A lack of overt emotion should not be confused with a lack of feeling entirely.

Additionally, while younger men raised in a more emotionally open culture may be better at articulating feelings, older men are not at all unable of it. Rebrand soft emotions as masculine "sports loyalty" or "team allegiance," and many men will happily express anger, hope, disappointment, or pride endlessly.

The most striking about Yarrow's railway volunteers is that, despite their horror of discussing feelings, they still managed to express what looks remarkably like concern and solidarity. When an older volunteer didn't appear and then returned clearly unwell, his friends noticed and were worried. However, as the professor notes, they intentionally didn't ask direct questions. Instead, they made tea, told jokes, and tried to be discreetly supportive while maintaining normality. They were looking out for each other pretty much as female friends would, except without ever verbally acknowledging the obvious issue.

The Core Issue: Does Bonding Require Words?

This is not everyone's preferred way of bonding, and it may not be yours. But if the true therapeutic value of friendship—what that combats loneliness and despair—is simply the awareness that another person is there enough to walk through life's difficulties with you, does that always be articulated with words?

The debate persists. Perhaps the healthiest approach is to acknowledge that varied styles of friendship hold equal worth, each satisfying the psychological needs of various individuals in their own powerful way.