attraction or deserved?

it seems that certain people, maybe all people, tend to be treated the same way from completely separate and different groups.

for example, i treat someone who i have known for decades a certain way. that someone is also treated the same way from a friend he/she just met a couple months ago. 

why is that? is it because that someone only befriends a certain type of person, or because that someone deserves to be treated that way?

what the heck am i trying to say?