Do you emulate your friends?

I think that’s a fairly normal thing, as it’s a human trait to want to bond with our peers to strengthen the community connection. Behaviors that I find appealing in one person may be appealing to others, and make us more valuable to the group. It also indicates to the person that we mimic that we find them worth imitating, which can be flattering. If I make the folks around me feel good, they are more likely to keep me around.

Err… who is your question aiming at, my friends or fictional characters?

I mainly frequent words/phrases my friends use. Other than that, I don’t emulate my friends often.

And it’s not necessarily because I like them, but because I hang out with them often. So, I have no idea that I emulate them. It’s like… my unconscious mind copy them, not me.

If they say something amazing, then I will. People become who they are through interaction with others.
I also learn from others’ personalities. For instance, I think my current math professor has a really good teaching tone and aura. She is not too loud or boisterous, speaks calm, and explains things at a walking pace, stressing the important words. You feel no tensions at all so you can focus on learning. I use that towards the middle schoolers that I tutor: some rowdy, some quiet.

It’s pretty common to become the environment you live in to some extent. Most people in a group have some similarities they either had already or develop over time as they spend time together.

If I love a look on someone I might try it out for size, but if the fashion doesn’t work for me I won’t wear it.

I purposely adopt some dialect of a new place I am living, because I think doing as the Romans do to some extent is a good thing. I say pop instead of soda when I am visiting friends in MI, I use y’all in the south, neither of which I use where I live now nor where I grew up.

I think it’s natural to pick things up from not only friends, but anyone you hang out with, family, coworkers. When someone says something relevant and funny, you pick up on it. I have my own sense of taste and interests, so those don’t change a lot although I’m always looking for new experiences. But language is always changing.

Everyone does this and many don’t realize it. I really found out who i was when i stopped hanging out with my old friends and just spent several years working long hours and hanging out by myself. I got a real job and quit my rock band. They ostracised me for it and there was a lot of jealousy on their part. (We were going to be “rockstars” lol) They dropped out of school and I finished. I guess I was the first one to damage their naive world-view. Before long I realized the only thing we really had in common was music and beer. Getting away from everyone who influences you for a while is a really good way to discover yourself, especially as a young adult.

I don’t have any friends.

I resist copying others until I see if it’s an original thought or a trend.

Example: most of my group of friends thought it was hilarious when the young man next door said someone had come into something “a little hot”. They started mimicking it. I saw the same phrase on-line and resisted.

I love innovation, but I don’t want to be using today’s ‘buzz word’. That’s just annoying.

My ropes leader uses “and all that jazz” at the end of explainations. Without meaning to, I now occasionally say things like, “I packed my shirts, shoes, and all that jazz.” I don’t even like it and I snicker when he does it, but he’s just so cool.

There are a few very close friends I’ll share a special phrase or humor point with, but I don’t carry it over to daily conversations in general. I work very hard at not using commonplace, zeitgeist phrases. It doesn’t resonate with me.

Yesterday, I used “Yummers!” while describing a dinner on Facebook. I actually got comments on my use of that word. It’s something a very close friend and I say to each other, it’s a matter of reinforcing bonding through conversation.

Nothing I say is original. I get all my jokes/sayings from movies, television or other people. I’d make a terrible comic.

Rarely, maybe when I was younger. Once in a great while I’ll pick up a line from a movie, but rarely do I emulate others.

I quote television and movies constantly.

And I tend to notice other people’s verbal idiosyncrasies – like my newfound friend, who say “Mmmkay” just a little too often, or my husband’s friend who has a running high-score for using “actually” the greatest possible number of times in a single sentence – but not copy them. In fact, they kind of grate on me.

I might have done that a few times back as a teen, but haven’t tried, or felt the desire, to emulate anyone forever.

Oh, can we count TV and fictional characters as friends? Then, Yes. I have friends and I do emulate them.

After rereading the question, it occurs to me that you wanted a more personal answer than the anthro/socio type I gave above.
Yes, I emulate my friends. My friends are people I like and admire, all of them with characteristics (compassion, humor, grace, etc etc) that I value and I am a better person for being with them and displaying those characteristics myself.
I would hope to never become so arrogant that I consider myself to be at the top of my social food chain where I feel that I have nothing left to learn from what others have to offer.
Along that road lies stagnation.

@canidmajor I liked both of your answers.

Only the straight ones pretending to be gay.

@Blondesjon I emulate my poor friends pretending to be middle class.

OH! And my dumb friends, pretending to be smart!