(TOEFL) Maintain a small number of friends over long time or make new friends easily

friendship skills quality

Any feedback would be appreciated!

Question: Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? The ability to maintain friendships with a small number of people over a long period of time is more important for happiness than the ability to make many new friends easily. Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

Social interactions and relationships with people have always played an important role in one's life and development. A varied array of relationships, such as what is mentioned in the question, may require different skills and can have different impacts on one's happiness. Although both types of relationships are crucial to one's well-being, I believe that the ability to maintain a small group of friends for a long time period is more important, due to the reasons in trust, support and interest.

To start with, a small group of friends is more likely to form a tighter bond to develop trust. In other words, it is easier to communicate and share life problems of each other, without the concern that someone in the group may spread this to others. Take my life experience for an example. I used to share my confusion about long distance relationship with my best friend in high school, who gave me some suggestions from her perspective, and her words were very helpful to me.

Furthermore, mutual support tends to be more effective in a small group of friends. This is because the large size creates a free rider effect, which means people are inclined to shy away from offering help with the presence of many other people, expecting someone else to do so. As a result, when there are a number of free riders in a large group of friends, mutual support becomes more challenging. A small group of friends, on the other hand, can overcome the free rider effect and it is easier to receive help and support.

Last but not least, a small groups of friends may share more interests in common, thereby enjoy their life together. A large group of new friends may have various preferences and hobbies, thus making it difficult to arrange group activities, which hinders the development of friendship. In contrast, a small group of friends with can easily enjoy quality time together, from playing video games to forming a reading club, without having to compromise to avoid conflicts.

In conclusion, the ability to maintain a small group of friends outweighs that to make a large group of new friends in a short time.

@yui meow
Hello there. Welcome to the forum. I hope you find the feedback that you receive here to be helpful for your writing endeavors. If you have any more questions, please do not hesitate to approach us for more input. Again, I hope that this helps!

First and foremost, I commend how put-together your essay is. Because you were able to integrate a lot of variation and dynamism into your writing, you were able to showcase how progressive your thoughts were throughout the writing. This makes it easy for the readers to understand the bulk of the text provided.

Having said these positives, I do recommend that you try to have a more analytical point of view when it comes to writing. Focus on curating information with ease through adding more substantive details. Take a glance at the example you've provided in the second paragraph. While it was great that you were trying to incorporate more real-life examples from your viewpoint, it would not be sustainable in the long-run given how you need more concrete and external options to carry you further.

Conclusion also needs a bit more work. Enhance this through adding more analysis by merging together your thoughts from all the paragraphs prior.

@yui meow
Hey there,
What I like about your essay is, how you structured the text. It is easy to follow your arguments. Another thing that I like is how you used linking words like "Furthermore", "To start with" or "Although".

Because you are preparing for TOEFL, I do recommend that you try to extend your essay. Now you used 339 words. Try to make it 400-500.

But all in all, a good essay as far as I can say.

@Maria
Hi Maria, thank you so much for your helpful suggestions! Indeed I need to work more on the reasoning part after the first sentence in the body paragraph, and maybe add another sentence to link the example to the reasoning. I also plan to paraphrase the main reasons again in the conclusion to make it more "conclusive".

@habebl
Hi habebl, thank you for your advice! Yeah it's better to have a longer essay. I extended the second paragraph and the conclusion, and it has reached 400-500 words.

@yui meow
Version 2 with longer 2nd paragraph and conclusions

... due to the reasons in communication, support and common interests.

Furthermore, ...

... of new friends in a short time, and this is because a small friend circle provide easier communication, more available support and more enjoyable group activities.