A psychologist reveals how “performative friendships” are on the rise and how to know if you’re in one

A psychologist has revealed she’s noticed a rise in “performative displays of friendship” and how you can tell if you’re in on one.

Dr Alison McClymont is a Chartered Psychologist who also creates online content on mental health topics.

She is also a writer, whose debut bookHow to Help Your Child Cope with Anything will be published in August.

in a video In an article shared on TikTok by the British Psychological Society, Dr McClymont discussed how social media can affect friendships.

Speaking in the clip, the psychologist said: ‘Social media culture has increased what I call performative displays of friendship.

‘People are encouraged to post images of things they’ll tag as friendship goals, or my best friend, or things that are essentially aspirational friendship images.’

How can you tell if you’re in a performative friendship? According to Dr. McClymont, seeing these kinds of images and hashtags can “really trigger jealousy” in some people. If you then feel pressure to create the illusion of a strong bond, you may be in one.

She explained: ‘If they see, for example, the person they thought was their special friend dating someone else, they suddenly feel excluded.

“And, in fact, this could encourage that excluded friend to feel more pressure to protect their friendship with the other.”

This can cause the person to become “needier” of that friend, she explained, adding: “They may also start to feel… pressured to create images or create an aspirational online life that looks like friendship goals.”

In an effort to create the image of this aspirational friendship, people may end up booking trips together or buying gifts for their friends.

By doing this, Dr. McClymont said, they are doing things they can document and post on social media, only to show other people.

“This could go so far as to exceed the time and even money requirements,” he said.

According to the psychologist, social media culture has affected some people’s friendships, making them more performative.

Viewers took to the comments section where they discussed the impact of social media culture.

‘And that excessive expenditure of time and money, if we want to call it that, can actually start to affect people’s mental health.

“I’ve seen that in my practice: People really feel an anxious internal monologue of, ‘Well, if I don’t do this, people won’t think I’m a good friend.'”

In the comments section, viewers shared their thoughts and experiences on how social media culture has affected their relationships. One wrote: “I think if people couldn’t take pictures or videos there are a lot of things they wouldn’t bother doing. Life now seems so performative and artificial.”

Another agreed, writing: “This is something I’ve always been passionate about and that’s letting social media be what it is, a simulation of reality, people get so caught up in it that they start to believe it’s real life.”

And a third added: “Very true. Not even genuine friendships that they brag about on their social media.”