There is a kind of conversation that seems increasingly difficult to find in college – and it might be the most meaningful social experience UCLA students are missing.
It’s the kind that happens when a few people are sitting in a living room, phones tucked away, and everyone has enough space to listen. It begins with one question and somehow stretches past midnight.
While parties can introduce students to new people, they rarely create the conditions for meaningful friendships. Relationships are more likely to grow through smaller gatherings centered on conversation, creativity and shared experiences.
Students should prioritize more personal, conversation-driven gatherings. UCLA should help make those gatherings possible by creating more welcoming communal spaces where students can sit, talk and get to know one another without the pressure of a large event.
College is associated with parties. The quintessential college experience, for many, involves packed houses, loud music and crowded rooms. Those events certainly have their place as they can be exciting and a way to meet new people.
The irony of modern college life is that students are constantly surrounded by people while simultaneously reporting feelings of loneliness. The 2024-2025 Healthy Minds Study found that 52% of students reported high levels of loneliness in 2025. It is entirely possible to attend parties every weekend and still graduate feeling mostly unknown.
Esha Mafruha, a rising fourth-year biochemistry and mathematics student, said parties often serve as an entry point for students who are still searching for community. For many first-year students, large social events feel like the most obvious place to begin building a network, she added.
But party conversations also tend to remain superficial, revolving around compliments or other small talk rather than deeper topics, Mafruha said.
While parties may be good places to meet people, they are not where real camaraderie is built.
The strongest friendships usually develop through dialogue. A 2024 study of social connection found that people’s feelings of connection during individual conversations were associated with greater relatedness and lower loneliness, with researchers identifying shared reality, responsiveness and genuine interest as necessary for a connecting interaction.
Aldo Garibay, a rising second-year architecture student, said parties are spaces where conversations are often interrupted by music and crowds.
“You meet someone new but you don’t really have a deep connection with them,” Garibay said.
Creating a lasting connection with someone you meet at a party is rare, he added.
An introduction is only the beginning of a friendship. Lasting relationships require the time and attention to move beyond surface level interactions, to ask questions and discover who someone truly is.
Those interactions are difficult to cultivate when the music is too loud to hear the person standing next to you.
Rachel Lin, a rising third-year physiological science student, said UCLA could facilitate these individual conversations by creating more inviting communal spaces.
UCLA offers many places to study, from libraries to designated study rooms. But, there are far fewer environments on campus designed simply for students to linger and talk. The distinction may appear small, but the purpose of a space can shape how students use it overall. A study room tells students to focus while a communal lounge can give them permission to stay awhile and start a conversation with a stranger.
“It gives people an actual place to gather and get to know each other without it being too big of a thing,” Lin added.
Imagine a UCLA where students gather in communal lounges around record players to share favorite albums, organize small dinners with strangers from class or spend an evening debating ideas instead of shouting over speakers. These places complement parties by offering Bruins another way to belong – one built around conversation and curiosity.
Perhaps the most memorable nights in college won’t be the loudest ones. UCLA doesn’t need more parties. It just needs more living rooms.
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