How to Make Friends as an Adult: Show Up, Then Change the Setting

As adults, many of us have moved for a job or completed college and found ourselves with a shrinking social circle. We are left with our workplace friends and acquaintances and try to make small talk with them over coffee. Of course, we can join clubs, volunteer, and take up a new hobby. But to form real adult friendships, we need to go through a series of events that can be intentionally engineered. We need to join a setting with a regular schedule and a fairly fixed group of members. Then we need to show up a number of times to become familiar to the others. Finally, we need to move our friendships to a new setting with that one familiar friend. In this article, we explore how to join a setting with a regular schedule, how to keep turning up to become familiar to the others and how to see one of them somewhere new.

Choose a place where the same people return every week

Joining one-off events and mixers can give you the feeling of being productive and meeting new people but they tend to leave you with a string of first conversations followed by nothing. So look for something with a fixed, regular schedule (a weekly run club for example) that has the same group of people attending every week. An 8-week pottery class, a series of volunteer shifts or a season of a sport’s rec league team are good examples.

In terms of whether a particular group is going to work for making friends, a useful test is to ask yourself whether, after a month or so, you can begin to rattle off the names of a few regulars who you would expect to see there the following week. If the answer is no, it may be that the group in question is too large and loosey-goosey, and that a smaller class or a team with a fixed roster of players would be more to your liking.

Choosing settings with pause points in activity also is helpful. Running clubs that serve coffee following runs or rock climbing gyms that allow time to rest between climbs provide natural conversation points. There is no need to force further interaction. Simply being present gives you chances to talk.

123

1. 1
   The weekly sign-up board

   Signing up for the same slot each week puts you with the same group. The names on the sheet also help you remember who you met.

2. 2
   The regular at the wall

   The person you see at the same time every week is your best starting point. A friendly hello by name on your second visit is an easy way to start.

3. 3
   The bench between routes

   People sit here waiting for their arms to recover, which makes a short conversation feel natural. Later, it is the easiest place to suggest getting coffee after.

Keep showing up until you are a familiar face

The first few weeks of attending the same activity can feel somewhat pointless. Why are you there? Will you ever meet anyone? These doubts are normal, and it will take time. Just because someone is friendly does not mean they are interested in being your friend. Adult friendships require a lot of time spent together with other people. Hall surveyed 355 adults who had moved to a new area in the previous six months. He also followed first-year students at the University of Kansas over the course of several weeks. His numbers for hours of time spent with acquaintances and then friends were roughly 50 hours to go from acquaintance to casual friend, 90 hours to go from there to friend, and over 200 hours for close friend¹.

While the 50 hours estimated to reach casual friend and 90 hours estimated to reach friend are based on self-reported data from hours spent with various others and cannot predict how any single friendship will go, not all hours spent with others will be equally fruitful. His research furthermore found that the hours spent joking around, playing games, etc. with acquaintances would count more towards forming friendships than hours spent working with them. Hall suggested that thus if you work with others then go have lunch or out for a drink with them, it signals that you are interested in being friends with them.

The simple act of going to the same place at the same time every week will start to make others expect to see you there and will make saying hello to them easier as soon as you do see them. Actively learn to remember the names of people you interact with regularly and keep using them.

Don’t worry if you struggle to remember a name or two early on: most people do and will ask again later in the session or on another occasion.

Move from small talk to something a little personal

Remember that small talk is the basis of any activity-related friendship. It might be obvious but it takes time to get to know someone in a setting that repeats for weeks. First you have to get to that point of sharing personal stuff about yourself, like why you enrolled in the course or what you plan to do this weekend. Then ask a related question so the other person can match it or keep things light.

You can look to use the same sort of approach for coming up with something to say after a session, such as to link the activity to your life, and ask for something in return:

It works because it allows the other person to reply with as much or as little information as they wish to share. If they reply briefly then you return to your activity and try again another week.

From the climbing wall to something personal (illustrative)

1. 
   Sam

   That last route was harder than it looked. You made it look easy.

2. 
   Jordan

   Ha, I've been coming on Tuesdays for about a year. Are you new?

3. 
   Sam

   Pretty new. I moved here in the spring and signed up partly to meet people, since I didn't know anyone in the city.

4. 
   Jordan

   I was the same when I moved. A few of us get tacos after the session on the first Tuesday of the month.

5. 
   Sam

   That sounds great. Is that next week? I'd like to come.

6. 
   Jordan

   It is. See you then, and good luck with that overhang.

A lot of adults hold back because they assume the conversation did not go as well as it actually did. They underestimate how much the other person liked them in their conversation. In studies of a personal development workshop for adults, strangers in a lab, and first-year college students trying to get to know their dorm mates, Boothby and colleagues found that the liking gap, or the tendency for people to underestimate how much the other person likes them, held for a number of different types of conversations². Note though that in these studies, the end point was how much each person felt liked by the other after they had had a conversation. They did not track whether or not friendships were formed.

Move to another setting with someone you have been friendly with in a shared activity

Working together at a gym or activity does not have to mean becoming friends at that gym or activity. You usually have to see each other somewhere else. In Hall’s research, time spent with a friend hanging out, joking around or playing games counted towards the friendship. Hours spent at work with friends however did not count as much towards the friendship¹. Hall said: “If you work together, go to lunch or out for a drink. These things signal to people that you are interested in being friends with them.”¹

One of the easiest versions of an extension of time spent together is to extend the time spent already hanging out together (e.g. to grab a coffee on the way home from a class he or she is already attending with you).

A low-pressure way to suggest it after a session:

Wording an invitation for a larger, one-time occasion, e.g. going for a weekend to the beach, is a skill in itself. Simply asking someone for a small occasion like coffee this first time is enough. If they refuse, that’s OK. You’ll get to talk to them again next week.

Follow up so things do not reset each week

After an initial interesting conversation it’s easy to fall back into harmless chit-chat. Refer to a previous comment the person made. You’ve shown you’re listening and now you have a discussion starter for the next time you meet.

Here is an invented example of how you might use your earlier conversation with Jordan to frame your next conversation: “How was your job interview?” You could use this as the starting point for your next conversation with Jordan after your session of tennis.

Swapping numbers is nice and easy to do after a few sessions, especially when you have something to refer to (a photo from a session, a podcast you recommended etc.).

Some connections can remain friendly, yet fill your time at the setting with warmth. Continue to attend and extend to other people, in turn. Each of these will probably develop at its own pace.

What to do next, based on how they respond

They matched your personal detail with one of their own+

At the next session, mention what they told you, then suggest coffee or a walk right after.

They kept it brief and went back to the activity+

Stay friendly and keep greeting them by name. Try one small personal detail again in a week or two.

You got coffee together and it went well+

Note one thing to ask about next week and suggest swapping numbers when you have a reason to send something.

They have turned down two suggestions+

Stop suggesting plans with this person, stay warm when you see them and give your attention to someone else in the group.

Your next step this week

Pick one of your repeating activities that meets at least weekly and show up for 4 sessions before making a value judgment. Learn one new name each week and then use that name in subsequent classes. By the third or fourth time you attend a repeat activity, try to pick one of the people you’ve had two or more “chats” with and go for a short coffee or walk after class.

If sharing a personal detail or asking someone for coffee makes you feel awkward, try rehearsing with a scene partner in Quippy and then putting your new conversational script into action in real life sessions.

Sources and references

1. University of Kansas News (2018). How to make friends? Study reveals how many hours it takes. Summary of Hall, J. A. (2018), Journal of Social and Personal Relationships.Two surveys: 355 US adults who had moved in the last six months, and 112 first-year KU students followed over several weeks; hour thresholds are estimates from self-reported time together, not guarantees for any one friendship.
2. Boothby, E. J., Cooney, G., Sandstrom, G. M., & Clark, M. S. (2018). The Liking Gap in Conversations: Do People Like Us More Than We Think? Psychological Science.Studies of lab strangers, first-year dorm mates and workshop attendees; measured how much people thought a partner liked them versus how much the partner reported; concerns liking after conversations, not friendship formation outcomes.