Roommate
From Free net encyclopedia
- For the 1995 film, see Roommates (film).
A roommate is a person with whom one shares a room or rooms. Affectionately known as roomie.
In the UK, roommate normally refers to a person sharing the same room, whereas in the US it typically refers to a person sharing the same house or apartment irrespective of whether they share the same room (bedroom). In the UK, the latter would usually be referred to as a housemate or flatmate (flat being British English for an apartment), if they shared the same house or apartment but not the same room. [1]
In most university dormitories, roommates are of the same sex. Cohabitants of apartments are also termed roommates. However, unmarried couples living together are generally not labelled roommates.
One of the more difficult tasks for the house office in college is matching roommates for incoming freshmen. Some statistics show that the academic grades, study style, social behavior and personality of one roommate will affect the other roommate's academic performance.
In Japan, people rarely live with roommates; perhaps given that most of houses are not designed in a way for strangers to share the house.
Roommates are a fairly common point of reference in Western culture, especially in North America. Therefore, many novels, movies, plays, and television programs employ roommates as a basic principle or a plot device.