Americans Are Hoarding Their Friends

Hypothetically, introducing friends from different social circles shouldn’t be that hard. Two people you like—and who like you—probably have some things in common. If they like each other, you’ll have done them a service by connecting them. And then you can all hang out together. Fun!

Or, if you’re like me, you’ve heard a little voice in your head whispering: Not fun. What if you’re sweet with one friend and sardonic with another, and you don’t know who to be when you’re all in the same room? Or what if they don’t get along? Worst of all: What if they do—but better than they do with you? What if they leave you behind forever, friendless and alone?

That might sound paranoid, but in my defense, it turns out these thoughts are common. Danielle Bayard Jackson, the author of , told me that when she was a high-school teacher years ago, she’d often hear students airing anxieties: or She assumed it was a teenage issue—until she began working as a of people just , with a caption like “when your birthday is coming up and you gotta decide if u wanna or not” or “ and they’re about to watch you switch between personality 1 & 3.” In a recent , the writer Chason Gordon confessed to an “overwhelming horror at merging friend groups.”