Canadians spending less time with friends, especially those of working age: StatCan

First at five we look into a new study that reveals face-to-face friendships are on the decline.

A Statistics Canada reports says Canadians are spending less time with friends than ever, with the decline sharpest among the working-age demographic.

The data released Tuesday show that in 2022, only 19.3 per cent of Canadians saw friends on an average day, down from 47.9 per cent in 1986.

The questions to those in the survey asks if they were with a friend or family member in person, separate from communicating using technology such as phone, email, or social media.

The report said the sharpest drop was recorded for people between 25 and 64 years of age, where the likelihood of seeing a friend on any given day fell from 42 to 14 per cent in the 36-year period.

“For people who did see friends, the average time spent together declined from 5 hours per day in 1986 to 3.8 hours in 2022,” the report said.

“These downward trends in seeing friends coincided with more Canadians worrying that they did not spend enough time with family and friends.”

More than 46 per cent of respondents reported feeling they did not spend enough time with loved ones in 2022, versus just under 34 per cent in 1992.

Canadians between 15 and 24 years old also saw the likelihood of spending time with friends on an average day fall by more than 30 percentage points during that time, although younger people remain the most likely to have the interactions at 41 per cent in 2022.

The report also showed Canadians in 2022 feel the most “pressed for time” since the early 1990s when data collection began, with almost a quarter of respondents saying they feel such pressure when compared with 15 per cent three decades earlier.

Laura Eramian, associate professor at Dalhousie University, said she isn’t surprised at the results reflecting the challenges of modern life in Canada when compared with conditions in the 1980s.

She said the rising cost of living likely means more Canadians are working multiple jobs, and the aging population could signify that working-age people have to navigate both child care and elderly care simultaneously, putting friendships into lower priority levels.

“It makes sense that would be the first thing to go in the sense that friendship by its very nature is informal and it’s voluntary, and people don’t tend to have concrete obligations let alone legal ones like a parent has to a young child to care for them,” Eramian said.

“So, when people are caught in these binds, I suppose it’s not surprising that the most flexible, the least formal, the least obligatory relationship is going to be the one that tends to go first.”

Luca Maria Pesando, an assistant professor at McGill University, said similar observations have been witnessed in other high-income countries with the same economic pressures, which all correlate with “higher levels of individualization.”

“Longer work hours, the expectation of being constantly connected through technology, and the ‘hustle culture’ all contribute to a state of chronic busyness, leaving little room for spontaneous interactions,” Pesando said.

He noted the impact of social distancing put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic likely also played a role.

“Thinking about the workplace as an arena for meeting and hanging out with friends, I also believe remote work may have further contributed to isolation and disconnection,” he said. “While I believe this is a real trend that goes beyond COVID, perhaps that period was among the most isolating ones.”

Eramian said the impact of technology and social media on in-person interactions remain undetermined, since some research showed such digital platforms actually facilitate more socializing in some people.

But she added that the question of why people may be socializing less goes beyond asking people to “make different choices about how they organize their time or reorganize their priorities or strive for a better work-life balance.”

“If we’re thinking about time pressure and friendship, we have to think about what kinds of larger structural pressures people are under,” Eramian said. 

“So, for example, are their work lives predictable? Are there things that people can make plans around? Are there enough free and public accessible spaces where friends can go to meet each other?

“Most places that you go outside the home cost money to enter. So, the question becomes, especially for people who are under major economic pressure and still want to spend time with friends, are there enough of these kind of free accessible public spaces for them?”

Pesando said the 2022 data set comes from a “particularly gloomy period” post-COVID, and numbers will likely stabilize somewhat in the future, although reforms to workplace policies are likely needed to counteract the decline.

“Canadian workplaces are increasingly recognizing the importance of policies that allow employees to have a life outside of work,” Pesando said. 

“Sufficient vacation time, personal days, and paid family leave are essential for preventing burnout and allowing for rest and social connection.” 

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 17, 2025.

Chuck Chiang, The Canadian Press