Friends at work, friends for life?

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London - We may be keen to escape the office at the end of the day, but it seems many of us are less eager to get away from our colleagues.

These days, we forge more friendships through work than through school, university, hobbies or family, according to a survey.

A poll found that one in three British workers finds their kindred spirits sitting across the desks or gossiping around the water cooler.

Almost a third of those polled said they have made the majority of their friends through work.

One in four said their social circle dated back to their school days, and just one in ten met most of their mates through university or other higher education. The poll also showed four percent of us made friends on holiday, and three percent found like-minded folk over a shared hobby.

Around a third of the 2,012 respondents said their best friend was someone they met at school, while 27 percent said they had found their closest friend at work.

A further 11 percent met their best pal through a mutual friend, while 10 percent got to know them at university and 9 percent shared a hobby.

David Johnson of mobile phone company O2, which carried out the survey, said: ‘The workplace is where we spend a lot of our time, so it’s bound to be the place that large numbers of friendships are made.’ - Daily Mail