The Friendship Researchers Who Are Also Friends

Each installment of “The Friendship Files” features a conversation between The Atlantic’s Julie Beck and two or more friends, exploring the history and significance of their relationship.

This week she talks with two friends who also happen to study friendship. They met at a conference back when very few relationship scholars were focusing on the topic, and became both friends and professional collaborators. They talk about what they’ve learned from their research and how they’ve applied those lessons in their own friendship.

The Friends:

Rebecca Adams, 69, a sociology professor in the gerontology program in the School of Health and Human Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Rosemary Blieszner, 73, an alumni distinguished professor in the department of human development and family science at Virginia Tech with a specialty in adult development and aging

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Julie Beck: How did you get into researching friendship, and what have you studied?

While I was in graduate school, my grandparents were living far away from most of my