brrly babbles about the effects of same vs other sex friendships

introduction

hello everyone and welcome back to another brrly babbles post! today the victim of my babbling is the effects of same vs other sex friendships. i decided upon this topic after encountering countless tiktoks of people saying that if their spouse has a best friend of the opposite gender, then it's a huge red flag. if you're wondering my opinion on this topic, i personally think that it's depends on their friendship and how they treat each other. i don't think that it's a red flag to have a best friend of the opposite gender BUT it does make me a bit insecure and jealous BUT THATS JUST A ME PROBLEM so...

anyways this topic of same vs other sex friendships got me thinking. is it better to have a spouse who only has same-sex friendships or a spouse who has a mix of both? if you get jealous super easily then you'd probably choose the spouse who has only same-sex friendships. this means like...no female interaction at ALL. i know that some of you probably say "my type is a guy who is a complete loser and looks like he's had no female interaction at all!" well sorry to break the news to you but having no female interaction has a lot of cons and its WAY BETTER to have a spouse who has a balanced mix of girl and guy friends. maybe not an opposite sex best friend because thats an entirely different story BUT just having friends who are another sex is way better than having no other sex friendships. like that was my OPINION at first and since i love to be right no matter what i wanted to prove that my opinion is scientifically right so i researched about it and found articles talking about the effects of same sex vs other sex friendships and the effects they have on people SO LETS BABBLE ABOUT IT!

my opinions on girl-deprived guys

the real start of this was a conversation with my friend and i told her that guys who have friends who are girls and guys and aren't "girl-deprived" are green flags. when you're deprived of something, you usually want it more than usual, like how touch deprivation makes you want more physical contact with other people! if a guy is girl-deprived, then they're going to want to feel more connection with girls and will treasure any connection that they DO have with girls. when this girl-deprived guy gets into a relationship, he'll be a little TOO obsessed with his partner. the guy's happiness will probably depend on the girl and he'll be too blinded by love to see the girl's red flags. he'll worship his girlfriend like a goddess and place her on a pedestal instead of treating her like an actual person. of course this is just a hypothesis please dont cancel me girl-deprived guys IM JUST SAYING guys who are girl-deprived would probably treat their girlfriends this way. if you want prove me wrong then date me I MEAN WHAT

anyways, guys who are girl-deprived probably wouldn't know how to treat their girlfriends correctly either. since guys who are girl-deprived wouldn't know how a girl thinks or what a girl likes they'd probably be...questionable partners. you might be arguing with me saying that by i, by stating this, am saying that all girls like the same thing and that i'm enforcing gender stereotypes. 

honestly i have no idea how to argue against that because i just typed up a huge paragraph on how females and males have different brain structures and think differently but science doesn't even have a definite answer on why females and males think differently and technically there's not a male or female brain so i don't really have a scientific explanation for why being girl-deprived would make you a bad spouse but i have opinions so i will continue talking about my opinions!

i think that if a guy doesn't have a lot of interaction with girls then he'd only be exposed to one side of society. guys tend to have varying opinions from girls for whatever reason and some guys also make offensive jokes. most of the time, the guys who make offensive jokes usually don't have female interaction. i think the explanation behind why girls make less offensive jokes than guys (FROM WHAT I'VE SEEN AT LEAST) is that girls are more open-minded and mature as a result of societal standards. the girl gender is expected to be more polite and nurturing while guys are expected to be aggressive and strong (probably stems from the fact that men used to play hunting roles and women played motherly  roles). WELL i think thats why girls are more open-minded at least. so if girls are more open-minded and have a different view on a lot of things, a guy who isn't exposed to these ideals would be a pretty bad boyfriend!!! 

in summary, i think that guys who don't have any girl interactions and are girl-deprived would be bad boyfriends because they wouldn't know how to treat a girl in a relationship, they'd put their girlfriend on a pedestal and wouldn't see her for who she truly is, and they're probably close-minded. remember, keyword: THINK. so to prove myself wrong or right, i read some articles and scientific papers like i stated earlier, and i shall go through what they said and we will see if i am right or wrong!

also if you're a girl-deprived guy reading this i think itd be nice to hear your opinion because my opinions are based on my own experiences! also i think it just logically makes sense that not having any girl interactions would have all of the negative effects that i stated earlier soooooooo OKAY moving onto the articles/ scientific papers that i read

Same-sex Versus Other-sex Best Friendship in Early Adolescence: Longitudinal Predictors of Antisocial Behavior Throughout Adolescence (why is the title so long)

this was the first scientific paper i found talking about the effects of same-sex vs other-sex friendships and i was super excited when i found it because i had to do like 5 google searches before i came across this one

honestly i really just skimmed through it because i was in the car going to a restaurant for breakfast and i had just woken up so i didn't understand some of it but i understood the main points from the paper and they're a bit contradictory HONESTLY not the best article to choose if i want to prove myself right but WHO CARES. i will not spread propaganda! only the truth and science!

so idk how they conducted the study because i didn't read that part and i don't really understand it either but they found that boys who have same-sex friendships are more likely to be antisocial than boys who have other-sex friendships HOWEVER this only happened in eigth grade (the article was examining same sex vs other sex friendships in adolesence). in sixth, boys with other sex besties were more likely to be antisocial while in seventh it didn't have an effect. they also found that guys who spend most of their time with close male friends are more likely to exhibit competition, dominance, and antisocial behaviors. additionally, since friendships with guys tend to focus on engaging in activities and friendships with girls focus on emotional support, guys probably feel like they gain emotional support by having girl best friends. this means that your spouse having a girl best friend just means they're more emotionally intelligent and therefore will be a better spouse!! of course this depends and there's not a definite answer to whether or not that's true because PERSONALLY if my man is depending on another woman for emotional support THEN WHY ARE WE DATING. okay unless that woman is his mother then i don't really care

pretty much guys who are girl-deprived are more likely to display antisocial behaviors. antisocial does not mean they're super mysterious and shy by the way. antisocial literally means "harmful to society" likeeeee i don't think that's what anyone wants in a spouse because personally i would like if my boyfriend was not a threat to society

antisocial traits that i copy and pasted from google search:

• repeatedly breaking the law.
• repeatedly being deceitful.
• being impulsive or incapable of planning ahead.
• being irritable and aggressive.
• having a reckless disregard for their safety or the safety of others.
• being consistently irresponsible.
• lack of remorse.

idk about you but i dont want my boyfriend to be antisocial so i think that you should find a spouse that has friends who are girls! the same goes for girls by the way, except it happens in girls who spend more time with the same sex. 

here's a table from the article!

as you can see, this is very contradictory to what i was saying BUT LIKE HERES ANOTHER TABLE THAT PROVES MY POINT!

additionally, having other sex besties in eigth grade predicts antisocial behavior in boys in 11th grade so i guess having a girl best friend isn't exactly the best thing...BUT my point was that having a balanced mix of friends who are another sex and your same sex is better than having only same sex friends so DONT EVEN WITH ME RIGHT NOW

Comparing Relationships: Same-Sex Friendships, and Cross-Sex Friendships, and Romantic Love

in the article it's stated that both men and women are likely to seek contact with a woman when under stress. people who interact with women more are also less lonely apparently! read this article about it LIKE i'm actually flabbergasted i didn't know that was a thing WOW GUYS TALK TO A WOMAN IF YOU'RE LONELY!!! this probably stems from the fact that women are more emotionally intelligent and also display less antisocial traits then men in general. 

it was also found that men tend to be closer in other-sex friendships than same-sex because they expect more nurturance which probably stems from motherly love!! additionally, it was found that men tend to enjoy time with their other-sex besties more than their same-sex besties AND ROMANTIC PARTNERS???? men are also more open in opposite-sex friendships which is probably because they think that women are more accepting and will give good romantic advice. the article also said that it's probably because men feel like they can be more free in an opposite-sex friendship because "there's less expectations and roles for appropriate behavior"

okay that's it for this article i don't feel like reading anything else about friendships and women and men and whatever i think my point is proven 

ending

thanks for reading my blog post guys! i think i learned a lot today and i did a lot of reading and now i just want to lay in bed and read my awesome academic rivals to lovers book called "i hope this doesn't find you". the cover is so pretty and its so NICE and i love it GOSH its so pretty okay BYE GUYS i hope you learned something new too! make sure you get at least ONE interaction with a girl every single day in order to maintain your mental health!!!