Are We Losing Deep Friendships?

Introduction

When was the last time you actually called a friend just because you were feeling low and wanted somebody to sit with you? We all have multiple group chats that keep buzzing all day long with memes, news, stickers and emojis. But how often do we call someone from those group chats when we’re having a breakdown. There are countless apps that claim to connect you to hundreds of friends (if you can call them that) you made along the way. But are they truly “connecting” you or just giving you an access to see their curated lives on a daily basis?

For people who were born before the Instagram era, we see a difference in the way friendships work. For people who were born during the Instagram era, friendships are mediated by social media apps and there’s no other way to look at it. So then the central question that arises now is that are we actually losing deep friendships, or are friendships simply changing shape?

This article is not meant to be read from an “old times were better” perspective. Instead, it’s meant to be a psychological exploration into the nature of friendships, what changed them and lastly, what makes modern day friendships feel shallow and emotionally fragmented.

What Makes a Friendship “Deep” Anyway?

Due to the constantly connected digital world that we are a part of, many people confuse access and the number of interactions we’ve had with emotional closeness. What people don’t know is that knowing someone from their social media feed and having a close watch on their whereabouts and daily routine (again through curated stories and posts) doesn’t make a friendship deeper. Meeting someone because they live nearby and were free that day doesn’t mean that we feel deeply towards them. Friendship lies in knowing someone’s true and raw self, even if they aren’t aware of it yet. It lies in staying with them and supporting them for a decision which you don’t fully agree with but you know it will make them happy. Friendship is traditionally meant to involve vulnerability without shame, consistency, fights followed by repair and shared emotional memories.

Deep friendships are rarely formed instantly; they develop through gradual emotional openness, trust, and consistency over time.Attachment theory suggests that our early relational experiences often influence how we navigate closeness in friendships too - shaping our comfort with vulnerability, trust, and emotional dependence.Social Penetration Theory by Irwin Altman and Dalmas Taylor explains that intimacy grows layer by layer, as people slowly move from surface conversations to deeper emotional disclosure. This process depends heavily on emotional reciprocity, where care, effort, and vulnerability feel mutual rather than one-sided. At the center of deep connection is also the human need for“witnessing” - the desire to feel emotionally seen and understood, not just socially surrounded.Research by psychologist John Cacioppo on loneliness shows that people can feel emotionally isolated even when they have friends, especially when relationships remain performative or surface-level rather than emotionally intimate.

Why Modern Friendships Feel Shallow

Multiple factors are responsible for the shallowness of modern day friendships-

1. The performance era of friendshipsAll of us experience our lives and have access to others lives through little boxes called phones and tools on them called “social media apps”. These apps require us to post perfectly curated,heavily filtered and sometimes fake moments of our lives. This requires a surrender of our raw experiences in exchange of socially accepted and valued moments of our lives that seem to be true. The pressure to be socially fulfilled online is making it difficult for people to admit offline that “hey, I need a friend right now”. Thus most of us continue to pretend like we have a lot of “emotional support” and keep mistaking followers for close friends.
2. Hyper-Productive LivesWork today has become more than just a part of our lives. It is a part of our identity, our self image and our life purpose. Due to so much value assigned to our professional lives combined with the modern day hustle culture, we barely get time to do anything apart from work. The after work hours are sometimes spent in surface level socialising at a “work party” in the name of networking. All of this leaves little time for maintaining actual friendships and hence catchups have become not only rare, but also intensely planned and are now based on social convenience rather than genuine desire to maintain those friendships.
3. Convenience Has Replaced CommitmentDue to the intense amount of workload and the mental energy required to create curated posts online, we have become quite lazy at directing efforts into sustaining friendships. Over time, we have quickly learnt to develop situational friendships. These are the kind of friendships that we develop merely because they are more convenient to us and are easy to maintain. A friend you made because you share the same gym together and go at the same time, or a friend you made while commuting to work together is a situational friend. Since everyone is constantly overwhelmed, low maintenance friendships that sit at the cusp of emotional distance but at the same time provide some kind of stimulation and entertainment are popular now.

Now that we have explored the factors behind shallow modern day friendships, let’s also look at ways in which we can make deeper.

Rebuilding Emotional Connection in a Disconnected World

Rebuilding connection in a digitally overstimulated world is not easy, but it's worth the effort if you really care about making your friendships feel less shallow

1. Stop Treating Friendship as “Background Maintenance”Many adult friendships slowly become passive - reduced to reacting to stories, occasional catch-ups, or assuming closeness will sustain itself automatically. Deep friendships usually require intentional emotional investment. This can look like scheduling uninterrupted one-on-one time, revisiting difficult conversations instead of avoiding them, or creating small rituals of consistency such as monthly walks, voice notes, or check-ins that go beyond convenience.
2. Learn to Stay Through Mild Discomfort Instead of WithdrawingA large number of modern friendships weaken not because of betrayal, but because people quietly retreat after awkwardness, misunderstandings, emotional neediness, or unmet expectations. Conflict avoidance and fear of “being too much” often prevent emotional repair. Strong friendships are built when people learn to tolerate small relational discomforts, communicate honestly, and return to conversations instead of disappearing emotionally.
3. Create Spaces Where Performance Is Not RequiredMany people feel socially visible but emotionally unknown because friendships are increasingly shaped around humour, productivity, aesthetics, or constant positivity. Deeper connection often emerges in spaces where people are allowed to be emotionally unfinished - uncertain, grieving, jealous, confused, or unproductive without feeling judged. Friendships become more intimate when people stop curating themselves for likability and begin revealing parts of themselves that are usually edited out socially.
4. Spend Time Together Without Constant Digital StimulationA lot of modern interaction happens alongside distraction -scrolling, multitasking, replying quickly, or consuming content together instead of experiencing presence together. Emotional closeness often develops in slower moments: sitting after conversations end, long commutes, shared silence, cooking together, or talking without urgency. Unstructured time allows emotional depth to emerge naturally instead of keeping friendships trapped in surface-level stimulation.
5. Understand the Emotional Patterns You Bring Into FriendshipsSometimes people long for deeper friendships while unconsciously fearing dependence, vulnerability, rejection, or emotional exposure. Self-awareness can help people recognize patterns like over-giving, emotional withdrawal, people-pleasing, or avoiding honesty to keep relationships comfortable. Reflective mental health spaces like Healo can support this process by helping people explore emotional loneliness, attachment patterns, burnout, and relational habits through psychologically informed conversations and exercises. In many cases, rebuilding connection with others begins with understanding the parts of ourselves that struggle to feel emotionally seen in the first place.