Understanding friendship: Young adults with Down syndrome exploring relationships

Having friends and being a friend defines us as human beings. Friends can play many roles in our lives, and without friends, life can become increasingly lonely. For young people, friends often take a counselling role in times of emotional stress, so loneliness or a life without friends who can understand the emotional contexts of friendships and counsel may affect a person's psychosocial quality of life. This paper describes a six session program that was designed to help a group of young adults with Down syndrome understand friendships better. The Down Syndrome Research Program LATCH-ON staff at the University of Queensland developed the program in conjunction with the Queensland Family Planning Association. During the sessions, the students explored and discussed various types of friendships and the emotions associated with them, using the students' own experiences and videos in conjunction with structured materials such as The Circle Concept (Smith, 1987) and Network Hand (Birch & Higgs, 1996). Some reflections from the authors' experiences with the program are provided. Future research directions are suggested.