You can quit a family. It just doesn't work.
Cornell sociologist Karl Pillemer ran the first large national survey on family estrangement and found that 27 percent of American adults had cut off contact with a relative — roughly 67 million people, and he believes that is an undercount, since it is not something people volunteer. About 10 percent were estranged from a parent or a child, 8 percent from a sibling.
The surprise was in what came after. Most of them were not relieved. Cutting off contact ended the conflict, but Pillemer found people still carrying deep sadness years later, longing for reconnection, wishing they could go back and handle it differently. Estrangement tracked with anxiety, depression and isolation. The tie went quiet. It did not go away.
Compare that with friendship. Dutch sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst followed a thousand adults over seven years and found that fewer than half the people in someone's close circle were still in it. Almost none of that was a falling-out. Jobs changed, neighborhoods changed, and the circle quietly refilled with new faces.
That is the difference, and it has nothing to do with affection. Friendship runs on liking, which is why it needs tending and why it ends when the tending stops. Family runs on nothing at all. It cannot be withdrawn, because it was never extended in the first place. Which is also why cutting it hurts for so long — not because anyone failed, but because there was never a mechanism for letting go.
Psychologists have measured the difference directly. Asked who they would help with an everyday favor, people choose whoever seems to need it most. Asked who they would save in a life-or-death emergency, they go by blood.
Rick Good spent ten years in the newspaper business, including with The News & Observer (Raleigh, NC) and The Greenville News (Greenville, SC). He co-wrote, with Melinda Coleman, Rutledge to Riley: Governors of South Carolina, 1776–Present (Published by The Greenville News), and is the author of Mind Games Trivia #1 (Amazon). He has recently spent 15 years creating original trivia content through Sounds Good Mobile Entertainment and continues that with his new company, SGME Software. He edits The Smart Reader’s money, real estate, and business coverage.
