I think it’s a spectrum. Affection might range in specificity from “there are peers that are associated with specific good things happening (e.g. a specific food),” to “I seek out some peers’ company using specific sorts of social rituals, I feel better when they’re around using emotions that interact in specific ways with memory, motivation, and attention, I perform some specialized signalling behavior (e.g. grooming) towards them and am instinctively sensitive to their signalling in return, I cooperate with them and try to further their interests, but mostly within limited domains that match my cultural norm of friendship, etc.”
I think it’s a spectrum. Affection might range in specificity from “there are peers that are associated with specific good things happening (e.g. a specific food),” to “I seek out some peers’ company using specific sorts of social rituals, I feel better when they’re around using emotions that interact in specific ways with memory, motivation, and attention, I perform some specialized signalling behavior (e.g. grooming) towards them and am instinctively sensitive to their signalling in return, I cooperate with them and try to further their interests, but mostly within limited domains that match my cultural norm of friendship, etc.”