In the grand scheme of college life, there are many important phenomena: middle-of-the-road dining hall food, random weeknight social events and, of course, the “freshman year friend group.”
You know your group from the first semester of college, where everyone clung together, did college firsts, stayed up too late and grew extremely close? And then it magically — or dramatically — dissolved by October? Yeah, that one.
While many students did not use a specific word to describe the phenomenon, many more recognized the definition.
“I’m familiar with the concept,” Sam Griff ‘28 said.
“Yeah, just never thought it was considered a phenomenon,” Zach Marshall ‘28 said.
According to Griff, he was told by others that he would make friends at the beginning of college, and then reach a point during the first semester where he would “find completely different friends.”
“That’s literally what happened to me,” Griff said.
Psychology professors JJ Togans and Deja Simon-Jennings — both social psychologists — each said that they had experienced this type of friendship during their own time in college.
“It’s a relatively common thing because of how the transition from going to high school to college, it’s a very new environment,” Togans said. “There’s a lot of uncertainty surrounding it. You’re lacking a lot of the social networks that you had.”
“We’re likely to form these new relationships early on as a means of satisfying our need for connection and belonging,” he continued.
Simon-Jennings expanded on the psychological aspect of these relationships.
“One of the key components that attracts us to other people is proximity,” Simon-Jennings said. “You initially link up with the people around you, that’s your roommates, the individuals on your floor, things like that.”
But freshman year friend groups can dissolve as people join other groups, drift away or fall out with one another.
“Another one of the main things that attracts us to people is similarity,” Simon-Jennings said. “As you get to know these individuals, maybe you have different interests, different ideas of fun.”
“Looking at different major classes that we might enroll in, or looking for clubs that more directly reflect our actual interests, we’re more likely to form more nuanced and deep relationships with people that are aligned with us,” Togans said.
While only some interviewed students were familiar with the freshman year friend group, none labeled it as inherently negative.
“It’s good to spend time with different groups of people throughout college,” Hope Duffy ‘29 said.
“My freshman year, at the start, was just bouncing between different groups of people,” Garrett Jones ‘28 said. “Figuring out who you really want to be around and what that looks like is a really important part of freshman year.”
“It’s probably good for you to realize you don’t have to get along with everyone,” Caleb Neff ‘26 said.
“You may feel awkward or uncomfortable if you know you start to discover some inconsistencies in those initial friend groups that you create,” Simon-Jennings said. “But rather than feeling pressure to conform or fit in with those groups, don’t be afraid to branch out.”
