Because familiarity breeds contempt and there is no-one you are more familiar with than the familial. Friends are fresh air, bright sunlight and firm ground compared to the dark, fetid swampland of kinfolk. I’m talking – as indeed the study was – about good friends, about the people worthy of the name.

By your late 20s you have usually learned to discard the toxic horrors and to cling only to the genuine articles. Obviously it’s great to have loads, but in truth you only need a handful of the right people to ensure life is worth living. People who make you burst blood vessels laughing. People who will say, like my friend S does when she can hear it’s time for me to go back on my anti-depressants, “You don’t sound well, Mangan”, and to whom you listen and trust. People you can do things and, most importantly, nothing with. People who will opine but not judge. People who will let you be you even, and especially, when you’re being an idiot.

Lucy Mangan on why we need friends as much as family