Premium
Touch attitudes in cross‐sex friendships: We're just friends
Author(s) -
MILLER MICHAEL J.,
DENES AMANDA,
DIAZ BRIANNA,
RANJIT YERINA
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
personal relationships
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.81
H-Index - 83
eISSN - 1475-6811
pISSN - 1350-4126
DOI - 10.1111/pere.12033
Subject(s) - friendship , psychology , romance , social psychology , perception , haven , safe haven , developmental psychology , international economics , mathematics , combinatorics , neuroscience , psychoanalysis , economics
Results from this survey indicated that within heterosexual cross‐sex friendships, perceptions of friendship intimacy for females were more strongly tied to their positive attitudes toward: enacting and receiving more touch, enacting and receiving more safe haven (e.g., caretaking) touch, and perceiving touch as more sexually arousing, when compared to males. Females were more motivated not to touch their cross‐sex friends in public regardless of intimacy perceptions and did not positively perceive safe haven touch if they did not have a romantic partner. It is argued that males' and females' attitudes toward touch in cross‐sex friendships diverge due to evolved differences related to parental investment and the manner in which they are socialized to perceive their roles in cross‐sex friendships.