What Is Friend?
“Sometimes me think, ‘What is Friend?’ and then me say, ‘Friend is someone to share the last cookie with.’”
– Cookie Monster
When I was in high school, we had two buses to accommodate those students who participated in after school activities. As someone who played sports, many an early winter night I would be on the bus, the chill of sweat permeating all of us. Walking into my family home, I would always be greeted with a hot meal, its warmth and fragrance blanketing me securely. The meals were never fancy, but they were always shared, even if it were just my Mom or Dad puttering around, asking me about my day.
History cannot be told without mentioning food. According to a 2017 Forbes article, food was the foundation of international travel routes, from wine to olive oil to spices. Food reshaped entire political systems: I give you the Boston Tea Party and the bread wars that culminated in the beheading of a French king and queen consort.
Food also has a historically integral relationship to health and medicine. Beyond its elemental role of providing key nutrients, food can be used to prevent and treat disease. According to the Food is Medicine Coalition, approximately one-third of US patients enter the hospital malnourished. However, if clients received medically tailored meals, they saw significantly fewer inpatient admissions.
A recent Nature Medicine article highlights several studies supporting individually tailored diets to combat diabetes and improve overall cardiovascular function. Health providers are now using genetic footprints to use food to improve health among their clients. Just last year, the Biden administration launched a collaboration with dozens of nonprofit organizations and companies, aimed at addressing access to and affordability of healthy foods. In addition, the funded collaboration will integrate nutrition programs to empower US consumers to make healthier food choices.
Food is not only a physiological need, but an emotional need as well. According to a 2014 Frontiers in Psychology piece, infants learn early to associate soothing and social interaction with food. Intake of certain items has been associated with less depression and a sense of wellbeing. Eating the same foods together lays a foundational trust: we are willing to put the same thing inside our bodies.
Food preferences are not shaped in isolation; family, friends, and cultural roots influence what and how we eat. The emotional effect of certain foods is shaped by memory—good or bad. An analysis of death row last meals showed a propensity to request foods that reflected the inmate’s cultural or regional roots.
A shared meal is more memorable and considered of higher value than one eaten alone. People who share food rate their relationships as more intimate. Conversely, individuals who pictured their mate sharing a meal in an illicit interlude experienced more jealously than the interaction occurring without food. Infants cannot survive without being fed, an innate nurturing trait which may account for why some go without food so others can eat.
Communal eating, whether in feasts or everyday interactions, is universally human. In Feasting: The Archaeology and History of Celebrating Food, B. Hadyn argues feasting was a form of domestication, as agricultural food surpluses proved more advantage for societies than hunting/gathering. Feasting was related to the control of food production, serving as both a way to create prestige for the host and commonality within a community. R.I.M Dunbar in his article “Breaking Bread: The Functions of Social Eating,” surmises that food sharing serves three functions: 1) wider community and inter-community relationships are developed; 2) friend and family relationships are strengthened; and 3) the physiological and emotional positive effects of food sharing are reinforced.
Researchers from the University of Oxford’s Big Lunch survey suggest those that routinely eat meals together felt better about themselves and reported a wider network providing social and emotional support. Numerous other studies corroborate that the size and quality of one’s social network positively impacts one’s health, wellbeing, and happiness. That said, a surprising number of individuals do not share meals often, although 76 percent of those surveyed acknowledged the benefits of breaking bread together. More than two-thirds of those questioned had never shared a meal with their neighbors, 37 percent had never eaten within a community group, and 20 percent said it had been more than six months since they had shared a meal with their parents.
Nearly 85 percent of Americans plan to travel this summer, with 42 percent saying they plan to travel more than last year, according to Vacationer. And close to one-quarter of US adults plan to travel internationally. So as we resume (or exceed) the normal pace of summer fun, do something good for your health: Make a friend; share a cookie. ▼
Sharon A. Morgan is a retired advanced practice nurse with over 30 years of clinical and healthcare policy background.