Published: 2026-01-03
Last Updated: 2026-01-03
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People often seek relationships through different contexts such as work, dating areas, or just walking around and talking to people in the community. Few adults are in contact with closely related relatives if they can avoid it going as long as 4-5 years without a phone call, visit, or email. This is a form of human expression called independence and there is an assumption that someone will pick up the phone when its time to check in for less than a day to explain everything is still going well and there is nothing negative to report about their adult life.
There is an expectation that statistically, a person will be able to make contact with a close relative without need of private investigators or human tracking databases every 4-5 years. It works pretty well for most people and work can offer a level of fulfillment on socialization needs that aren't available through other relationship formats. A lot of human relationships are work oriented and they provide a level of satisfaction based on commonalities on the understanding of ones environment.
School is often a bad place to seek relationships outside of middle school or high school. Even then, people tend to make less than 5 friends they are in contact with regularly but with some effort some kids can make 20-30 friends they talk to more than just once or twice or occasionally throughout school enrollment. Making friends in college or university was popular in the 1960s. After 2010, it was discovered that college students make 1-2 friends on average during 4 years of enrollment. For a lot of students, this is an enrollment advisor or registration office that helps them pick the right classes. Students change from class to class and most people don't keep in contact when class ends. They are too busy with work plans or already have their schedule set outside of college.
Some students do make friends in college or university and it doesn't hurt to ask but its also important to be mindful that most people are busy and don't want to be in school in the first place.
This leaves work and dating areas as the primary place of socialization for adults. Hobby areas are a distant 2nd or 3rd but, many people go there to wind down from work and don't want any commitments with their hobbies. Occasionally, two people will meet in a hobby area and meet more than a few times, possibly becoming friends but this is rare. Everyone is friendly and polite but may not have time for a friendship commitment on their schedule.
Work is fun for most people and often considered better than school. It provides income instead of debt and often, the tasks for school are similar but with loans instead of a paycheck. School has its place and thats acknowledged for new workers.
Dating areas are where most people making friends because work may have HR policies that prevent people from fraternizing with co-workers. A non compete policy may prevent people from dating people with similar job roles at other companies. Getting friendzoned is not necessarily a bad thing, it can result in a person to search for dates with, or with someone to go to hobby areas with.
What people are often looking for when they say they would like a relationship is something romantic. A person that is waiting at home after work or will stop by to visit them on their days off. Someone to share plans, goals, surprises, successes, and failures with. This takes a little more effort and most dates will last less than 1 year for a lot of people. While this is discouraging to some, each date leads to self discovery and better questions to ask for the next date. Most people will also find a long term relationship or partner with less than 5 dates. However, it should not be expected that the first date will result in a long term relationship because of the final decisions on long term relationships is sexual compatibility which includes sex drive, frequency, desire, and wait times.
This has lead to a lot more people getting friendzoned and inadvertently, this can lead to longer waiting periods in between dates. Especially with a busy work schedule and a list of hobbies to do during time off.
Relationships require a lot of commitment and most people consider them more long term. A person can be seeking relationships only, open to relationships, or not seeking any long term commitment. These are questions to ask during dates, if its important then it might make sense to include it in the list of 5 quick dating questions.