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Society has a hard time believing a “just friends” label between people of the opposite sex. Or maybe it’s that “just friends” implies that “the relationship is not what it could or ought to be but is “just” a friendship.” (O’Meara, 1989) Many different values and behaviors affect cross sex friendships such as, attraction, gender roles, past relationships, education and obviously, family values. In the first article, ‘I like you . . . as a friend’: The role of attraction in cross-sex friendship” Reeder explains that attraction, and the different types of attraction affect cross sex friendships. There are four major types of attraction that are included in cross-sex friendships. The four attractions are subjective physical/sexual, objective physical/sexual, romantic, and friendship. These four different types of attraction can be present separately or collectively within a friendship. The first attraction, subjective physical/sexual, is represented when one of the friends feels sexual or physical attraction to the other friend. The friend who feels the attraction starts off the friendship based on the expectation of the friendship developing into a romantic relationship. In a high majority of subjective physical/sexual friendships the feelings were strongest in the start of the relationship. Because of the imbalance of feelings, clarification is usually needed to maintain equilibrium in this type of attraction so the friendship continues to strengthen. Objective physical/sexual attraction is similar to subjective physical/sexual attraction, however while one friend admits the other friend is good-looking she/he does not feel the attraction. The friend may realize that others find the friend good-looking, but she/he only has platonic feelings for the friend. As an example, a man might make the comment, “My best friend, who is a girl, is really attractive and I see and can relate to that, but I just don’t feel the attraction myself.” These type of attractions are healthy for both parties. The third attraction is romantic appeal. In romantic attraction the friend is interested in turning the friendship into a romantic relationship. Usually the interested friend has ulterior motives in the friendship and is hopeful the friendship will advance into a “coupledom” or sexual relationship. Romantic appeal is the least common of all four attractions, and the most successful at ruining cross-sex friendships where one party does not share romantic feelings. The last attraction, friendship attraction, is the most common. Lots of cross-sex friends grow to like each other, and even love each other, as friends, with absolutely no extra sexual feelings.
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