According to a 2006 study, our circle of close friends is getting smaller. Over the past twenty years, the number of people we can discuss "matters important to us" dropped nearly a third, from a mean of 2.94 to 2.08. The number of people who said they had no one to talk to about important matters more than doubled, to nearly 25 percent.

A 2012 New York Times article added that this scarcity of close friends has especially impacted mid-lifers. During midlife it's harder to meet the three conditions required for making new friends—proximity; repeated connections; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other.

The article went on to state:

In your 30s and 40s, plenty of new people enter your life, through work, children's play dates and, of course, Facebook. But actual close friends—the kind you make in college, the kind you call in a crisis—those are in shorter supply. As people approach midlife, the days of youthful exploration, when life felt like one big blind date, are fading. Schedules compress, priorities change and people often become pickier in what they want in their friends. No matter how many friends you make, a sense of fatalism can creep in: the period for making B.F.F.'s [best friends forever], the way you did in your teens or early 20s, is pretty much over. It's time to resign yourself to situational friends: K.O.F.'s (kind of friends)—for now.