What is better in friendship: honesty or support?

It depends on the level of intimacy and circumstances, factors influencing the willingness to be completely honest and accept the risk of friction.

In dialogue De FriendshipWritten in 44 BC. The Latin orator Marcus Tullius Cicero argued that “with the exception of wisdom, the immortal gods have not given humanity anything better than friendship.” And he identified sincerity as one of the most important characteristics of this type of relationship, calling the indicator of true friendship “both exhortation and exhortation, openly, but without harshness, with patience and without malice.”

Sincerity in friendship, which Cicero opposed to flattery, is still the starting point for reflection and frequent conversation today. In reality, between people who are friends and consider each other friends, there is a balance, often difficult to maintain, between a tendency towards unconditional complicity and a tendency towards complete sincerity, even at the cost of exposing deep differences that give rise to friction and discussion. . And there are risks in both inclinations: leniency, on the one hand, and distancing, on the other.

For example, it may happen that after a new relationship, a person’s behavior makes his friends suspect that the new relationship is harmful. In such cases, it can be difficult to know what a good friend of the person should do: whether it is appropriate for him to share this perhaps unfounded suspicion, or to provide unconditional support and leave the task of unfounded advice to other circles. necessary. For example, this person’s parents and family members may feel more entitled or obligated to be honest because this type of relationship is more defined and formalized.

In a certain sense, friendly relationships are completely different from family, marital and other types precisely in that they do not imply specific obligations, but are actually defined precisely by their non-binding nature. Even in the case of intimate relationships, it is not certain that sincerity is the most appropriate choice in all circumstances, much less in those in which sincerity would mean risking the end of the friendship and therefore eliminating the possibility of benefiting from it.

In general, as I wroteAtlantic, sincerity and silent complicity are tendencies that coexist in friendships. Friendship, in the words of Scottish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, “survives and thrives only if the other person’s sincerity can be relied upon.” But from another point of view, as the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, friendship is almost always a human relationship, based on the fact that some things “are not said, they must never be touched,” because if “these pebbles fall into the screw , friendship falls apart.

It often happens that people united in friendly relations habitually lie to each other in order to strengthen the relationship themselves and establish mutual trust, which has been known and studied for some time in the social sciences. There are countless circumstances in which lying is primarily the result of “prosocial” intentions and behavior, according to a 2015 study by American behavioral science researcher Emma E. Levine and American researcher Maurice Schweitzer, co-authored by American social psychologist Adam. Galinsky’s book Friend and Foe: When to Collaborate, When to Compete, and How to Succeed in Both.

According to Levin and Schweitzer, one of the times when lying with good intentions is most likely to occur is when you have the other person’s interests at heart rather than your own, while harmful lies are usually motivated by selfish interests. It’s precisely when it comes to establishing strong relationships and mutual trust that people paradoxically place far more importance on the other person’s goodwill and intentions than on their absolute sincerity, Levin explained to the magazine. Time.

Even in other circumstances, when there is not enough opportunity to change the situation or behavior, a lie can be considered a benefit to the other person: because at that moment there is nothing concrete the person can do to change something. However, “brutal sincerity” in such circumstances, according to Schweitzer, is often just an excuse to “just be bad”: something that risks rendering any possible constructive communication ineffective, no matter how sincere.

There are many cases where the exchange of information, no matter how sincere, is of no use if the person to whom it is addressed receives it at the wrong time. Imagine that the company one of our friends works for is about to begin a massive layoff plan just before the friend leaves for his honeymoon, would it be appropriate to tell this person or not? “In these situations, people prefer the truth to be revealed later,” Levin said. Moreover, it is unlikely that a person planning to go on a honeymoon will have the time, opportunity and desire to look for other employment opportunities if there is a suspicion that he will soon be fired.

The tendency toward complete sincerity in friendships also tends to depend largely on the level of intimacy, which is presumably higher when the friendship is long-lasting. According to Levine and Schweitzer, in less experienced relationships, sincerity is a riskier factor that can reduce trust and destroy the relationship. The reason is that in this case, both parties are less aware of the other person’s intentions and may doubt his goodwill.

In general, various studies in the field of psychology, including one published in 2017 by Canadian psychologists Beverly Fehr and Cheryl Harasymchuk, show that satisfaction with friendships is higher the more the relationship resembles the ideal model of intimate relationships. But this model includes both sincerity and complicity, which can easily come into conflict. When asked what is typical of a close friendship, people surveyed in studies reviewed by Fehr and Garasimchuk responded with things like “if I make a mistake, a friend tells me” and “if I need advice, a friend gives it to me.” ”, but also things like “no matter who I am or what I do, a friend will still accept me.”

In another study, Fehr and Harasymchuk asked participants how they dealt with various problems in romantic relationships. And they found that most people were willing to discuss these problems much more often than in friendships, where there is a tendency to be reluctant to intervene and more willing to wait until problems are solved or improved on their own. According to Fehr and Garasimchuk, a certain “culture of passivity” prevails in most friendships, since the risks of not telling the truth are quite low, and the risks of alienating a friend by telling the truth are very high.

For this reason, it may happen that only at the end of a love relationship, and not during, a person becomes aware of any perplexities and doubts of friends regarding the just ended relationship. Not necessarily because these friendships were not genuine, but because most of these friends did not feel that they had this task ahead of them, and perhaps instead felt that they should be present and supportive at the end of a love relationship.

This does not mean that passivity is characteristic of all friendships. In the case of longer and more intimate relationships, it is usually easier to deal with even the most sensitive and problematic topics because, as Fehr said onAtlantic, people have more “idiosyncrasy credits” to spend. According to Fehr, while at the beginning of friendships people tend to conform to social norms and follow routines in order to appear “normal,” as the relationship strengthens, in some cases the ability to deviate from these norms and the willingness to take risks increases. friction and idiosyncrasy.

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