and the yearlong relationships you've had with colleagues, friends, family, it's just a long con of lies.

還有你與同事、朋友、家人多年來的關係只是一個漫長的謊言騙局。

Well, according to science, you're not wrong.

根據科學研究，你的感覺是對的。

A 2016 study by researchers at M.I.T analyzed friendship ties in 84 subjects ages 23 to 38.

麻省理工學院的研究人員在 2016 年的一項研究分析了 84 名 23 至 38 歲受試者之間的友誼關係。

They were asked to rank how close they were to each person on a scale of 0 to 5.

他們被要求以 0 到 5 的等級對他們與彼此之間的親近程度進行排名。

0 was: I don't know them; three being: friend, and five being: one of my besties.

0 分是：我不認識他們； 3 分表示朋友，5 分則是好朋友。

They found that while 94% of the subjects expected their feelings to be reciprocated, only 53% of them actually were.

他們發現，雖然 94% 的受試者希望他們的友誼得到相同的回報，但實際上只有 53% 的人如此。

Now you may think, "Okay, Anna, 84 research subjects, that's a small sample size. That does not mean Jack shit about me, about half of my friends."

現在你可能會想：「拜託，才 84 個研究對象，這樣本量太小了。這並不表示 Jack 會講我，或我其他的朋友壞話。」

No, you're wrong.

不，你錯了。

Kate Murphy from the New York Times reported that these results are consistent with data from several other friendship studies of the past decade, comprising more than 92,000 subjects.

《紐約時報》的 Kate Murphy 報導說，這些結果與過去十年其他幾項友誼研究的數據是一致的，總共有 92000 多名受試者。

And this put friendship reciprocity rates at 34% to 53%.

而這些研究顯示友誼的互惠率只有 34% 至 53%。

Half of your friends aren't your friends.

有一半的朋友其實不是你的朋友。

Why is there such a discrepancy and who we think our friends are versus who actually considers themselves one?

為什麼會有這樣的差異？而我們認為的朋友還有實際上真的是朋友的有誰？

Well, one of the computational social science researchers on the initial M.I.T team, Alex Pentland, suggested that most people likely operate out of desperation to maintain a favorable self image.

麻省理工學院的計算社會科學最初的研究團員成員之一，Alex Pentland 表示，大多數人可能是為了保持良好的自我形象才會跟他人維持友誼。

We like them. So they must like us.

我們喜歡他們，所以他們肯定也喜歡我們。

Even if we hate ourselves.

即使我們討厭自己也是。

Ronald Sharp, professor of English at Vassar College, he teaches this course on literature of friendship,

瓦薩學院的英語教授 Ronald Sharp，他教授關於友誼文學的課程，

he was telling the New York Times, Kate Murphy, that treating friends like investments or commodities, which social media often has this doing is an anathema to the whole idea of friendship.

他告訴《紐約時報》的 Kate Murphy，把朋友當作投資或商品，像現今的社交媒體社會經常做的事，是對整個友誼理念的一種否定。

If you don't understand what anathema is, I googled it as well 'cause I was like, "I don't know what this man is saying."

如果你不知道什麼是 anathema，我有上網查了一下，因為我不知道這個人在說什麼，

Now (it) basically means you, like, really dislike something or fun fact, it's a formal curse by a pope or council of the Church.

基本上，它的意思就是你真的很討厭的東西，還有另外一個有趣的意思，它是教皇或教會理事會宣達的正式詛咒。

So I guess both are wrong. Treating friends like commodities may indeed be a formal curse by the pope that nobody likes.

所以我想兩者都不是正確的意思。像對待商品一樣對待朋友，可能確實是沒人喜歡的教皇詛咒。

I formally curse you. Never again, will you appear in my selfie or Tiktok, you clown-chasing whore.

我正式詛咒你。 你再也不會出現在我的自拍照或 Tiktok 中，你這個丟人現眼的婊子。

Sharp says that in many of our friendships, we spend way more time interacting with each other via social media than actually hanging out in person, which is probably how this perception gap actually came about.

Sharp 說，在我們許多的友誼中，我們花太多時間通過社交媒體相互交流，而不是面對面出去，這可能是造成這種認知差距的真正原因。

And to be fair, Sharp obviously said all this (was) pre-COVID, before digital interaction was necessary to keep our friendships alive.

而且公正地說，Sharp 說過所有這一切是發生在疫情之前，在數位交流對於保持我們的友誼是必要之物之前。

And I know this study sounds awful.

我知道這項研究聽起來很糟糕。

Half of your friends don't even consider themselves to be your friends.

你有一半的朋友甚至不認為自己是你的朋友。

But if it makes you feel better, Robin Dunbar, a renowned British anthropologist did this study that revealed that while 150 is the maximum number of social relationships the average human can maintain with any degree of stability,

但這也許能讓你感覺好一些，英國著名人類學家 Robin Dunbar 所做的這項研究表明，雖然 150 個人是一般人在任何程度下可以穩定維持的最大社交友誼數量，

which seems pretty high and impressive, 150. I couldn't even fill out my Myspace topic.

而這數字其實蠻高的。我甚至連 Myspace 主題都寫不到那麼多字，

Anyway, 150 is the most you can maintain, but we are only actually able to maintain five close, high-quality friendships at a time.

總之，150 個人是你最多可以維持的，但我們實際上一次只能維持五個親密的、高質量的友誼。

Anything more than five, he said are more than likely not high-quality friendships.

他說超過五個就可能不是高質量的友誼了。

So the next time you're minding your own business and your anxiety disorder sends you on a spiral and says that all of your friends secretly hate you, smile. Because half of them do.

所以下一次當你在關心自己，而你的焦慮症讓你陷入無止盡的漩渦，稱你所有的朋友都在暗地裡恨你時，請一笑置之。 因為確實有一半的朋友是這樣的。

Half of them don't give a shit about you or consider you to be a friend, which personally, I find truly comforting because I knew it all along.

他們之中有一半的人對你不屑一顧，也不把你當做朋友，就我個人而言，我覺得這確實令人欣慰，因為我一直都知道這個真相。

And the pandemic has more than shown me and probably all of us just exactly who our tribe is.

而這場疫情不僅向我，也向所有人擺明了我們真正的朋友到底是誰。

Back in the day, you know, you have so many acquaintance friendships or people you only saw at parties and there was this illusion that we had a lot of close connections.

在過去，你有很多熟識的朋友或你只在聚會上見過的人，造成有一種錯覺就是認為我們與他們之間有緊密的聯繫。

But I think that actually prevented us from becoming more emotionally intimate with our people because our attention and our social circles were so fragmented and spread apart.

但我認為這其實阻止了我們與朋友之間在情感上變得更加親密，因為我們的注意力和我們的社交圈是如此的分散。

So thank you science for not just confirming my worst fears, but assuring me that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. Hated by half of the people I know.

所以感謝科學不僅證實了我最擔心的事情，也證實了我的想法是對的——有一半我認識的人討厭我。

I'm Anna Akana. Thank you to the patrons who supported today's video and thank you to daddy Squarespace for sponsoring today's episode.

我是 Anna Akana。感謝贊助今天影片的支持者，還有感謝乾爹 Squarespace 贊助今天的節目。