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Conclusion
Friendship: An Echo, a Hurrah, and Other Reflections
Daniel PerlmanFriendship is the hardest thing in the world to explain. It’s not something
you learn in school. But if you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship,
you really haven’t learned anything.
— Muhammad AliMuhammad Ali is not my usual source for wisdom. In his friendship quote, how-
ever, I like his implicit message that it is beneficial for us in our daily lives to have
grasped the meaning of friendship. Yet I also see in his remark what I hope is becom-
ing a falsehood— namely, his view on whether friendship is something you can
learn about in school. It seems to me the current volume is a testimonial that we
now know a considerable amount about friendship and we can teach a lot about its
nature, its antecedents, its dynamics, and its consequences.
My goal in this chapter is to offer reflections on what the contributors to the
current volume have accomplished. I comment on both the chapters in the book
and on friendship as an area of research. In places I draw on bibliometric evidence.
In his foreword, William Rawlins claims that friendship is elusive to study yet
vital. I touch on both those points, starting with thoughts on why friendships
are important. Then, I turn to the elusive issue of how to define friendship. Next,
I present bibliometric information on the growth, volume, and disciplinary con-
text of friendship research. After that, I address a central paradox inherent in friend-
ships: their beneficial and detrimental aspects. Finally, I end by considering the
future directions of work on friendship.
Two Reasons W hy Friendships Are Important
I am delighted that Mahzad Hojjat and Anne Moyer have assembled this volume.
Hurrah! I am an unabashed fan of studying friendship; I am appreciative of the
range and caliber of scholarship the editors have brought to bear on friendship.