Why it’s good to be nostalgic: Study shows sentimental people excel at maintaining friendships

Do you have lots of close friends—and work hard to keep it that way? If you’ve answered “yes”, you are probably nostalgic. People who are prone to nostalgia have more close friends and put more effort into maintaining their friendships and other relationships than less sentimental sorts.

That’s the finding of a new study of almost 1,500 individuals in the U.S. and Europe, published in the journal Cognition and Emotion.

The finding is important because maintaining close relationships with others is essential for our health and well-being, say the researchers from the University at Buffalo, in the U.S., and Kyoto University, in Japan.

Previous studies have found that people who have friends and confidants are happier with their lives and less likely to suffer from depression. They are also less likely to die prematurely. Having strong ties with others also provides valuable support during difficult times.

Close relationships seem particularly important. However, our social circles tend to shrink as we get older.

In their study, the authors carried out three pieces of research into the links between nostalgia and the size of a person’s social network.

For the first experiment, a group of undergraduate students in the U.S. was surveyed about how nostalgic they were and about their friendships.

Nostalgia was measured by asking questions such as “how important is it for you to bring to mind nostalgic experiences?” and “how often do you experience nostalgia?”

Other questions covered how motivated they were to make new friends and to maintain their existing friendships and how many people were in their social circle.

The students were aged 19, on average. They had an average of seven people they were very close to—so close that it would be difficult to imagine life without them. They also had another 21 people who were still important to them.

Analysis of their answers showed that those who said they were nostalgic also put more importance on maintaining their friendships and had the most very close friendships and other relationships.

The second experiment looked at whether the same was true of non-students in the U.S. An online panel of adults answered the same questions as the students. They also did a short personality test.

The participants, whose average age was 40, had smaller social networks than the students. They had five people they were very close to, on average, and about 14 other people who were still important to them.

Once again, those who were nostalgic tended to put more effort into maintaining their friendships and had the most very close friendships and other relationships.

This was the case regardless of other personality traits, such as extraversion.

The third experiment used data from a long-running Dutch survey, the Longitudinal Internet Studies for Social Sciences (LISS), to examine the effect of nostalgia on social networks over a seven-year period.

This found that the participants became more nostalgic as they got older. When questioned in 2013, they scored an average of 3.95 for nostalgia, out of a possible seven. By 2019, this had risen to 4.21.

The participants who scored “high” or “medium” for nostalgia kept the same number of strong social ties over this period—people they could talk to about important matters.

In contrast, those with low levels of nostalgia had 18% fewer close relationships.

Taken together, the three sets of results indicate that a tendency to reminisce about happy times we spent with others helps realize the importance of such relationships—and motivates us to maintain them.

“People who feel nostalgic more often and value those memories are more aware of their important relationships and the need to nurture them,” says researcher Kuan-Ju Huang, a Ph.D. student at Kyoto University in Japan. “This means these friendships may be more likely to last, even as we get older and our lives, interests and responsibilities change.”

The study’s limitations include not distinguishing between friends, family members and romantic partners when measuring the size of a person’s social circle and limiting the research to two countries.

Mr. Huang admits to being nostalgic and explains how this can begin for everyone at quite a young age: “I started my Ph.D. as an international student in Japan during the COVID pandemic. During that time, I observed that many people, including myself, found comfort in listening to nostalgic music and watching old videos.

“There is evidence showing that young adults report nostalgic feelings slightly more frequently than middle-aged adults, while older adults report dramatically higher levels of nostalgia.

“High levels of nostalgia in young and older adults occur for different reasons. Life transitions during emerging adulthood, including leaving the family home and entering college or the workforce, may trigger a psychological need to find solace in nostalgia.

“Young adults may reminisce about their high school years or family moments when facing challenges during the transition to adulthood. For older adults, nostalgia is more likely to be associated with experiences about loss and feelings of a limited future.

“Overall, my own experiences of nostalgia inspired this study and for us to explore how it can strengthen one’s social connections.”