One important issue that constantly emerges from the literature on marital breakdown is men's susceptibility to depression and suicide in the aftermath of separation and divorce. In part, this may be a consequence of the fact that men's friendships are more casual, and hence do not provide the emotional support that women's friendships with other women provide in these circumstances. However, it is made worse by the fact that women tend, by default as much as anything else, to take over responsibility for creating and managing the couple's combined social network. Because women are socially more proactive than men, men often end up with a social network dominated by their wives' friends simply because the wives arrange the social events and the husbands just go along with it. Wives often try to encourage their husbands to contact old male friends, only to be greeted by a frustrating shrug of the shoulders. Irrespective of the cause, men risk ending up with no social network other than their own family after a divorce or the death of a spouse.

1. Men’s friendships are more casual than women’s (and thus provide less emotional support)
2. Once married, women take over responsibility for the couple social lives (and men end up with fewer of their own friends—it’s more couple friends)