Academic Advising as Friendship

We present a theoretical basis for engaging in academic advising as friendship and offer examples of the applicability of friendship in advising. We begin with interconnections between civic friendship and personal friendship in the context of academic advising. Next we overview theoretical work on communication and friendship that offers characteristics and ideals of friendship relevant to academic advising. Then we provide a dialectical framework describing six tensions that potentially emerge in the advising relationship viewed as a friendship. We argue that advisors and advisees must negotiate the tensions and benefits that potentially arise from practicing the academic advising relationship as friendship.