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Besides the post referenced by @suchmoon, there is another interesting one that dates from end of May 2018, where I analysed the factor you are on about (see
Is it true that we only send sMerit to our buddies ?).
What I concluded in that post was the following:
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a) On Average (but who is an average John Doe right?), we send sMerit to 17,14% of users of our network, who have at some point also awarded us with sMerit (reciprocal). Therefore, on average, 82,86% of the people we send sMerit to have not sent us any at any time.
b) In terms of Total sMerit, we sent 24,13% on average to out reciprocal network, and therefore 75,87% of our awarded sMerit goes to people in our network who have not awarded us with sMerit.
The above varies from rank to rank, but it goes to show that we tend to award way more to people that have not merited us at any time (non-reciprocal) yet that those who have (reciprocal).
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In conclusion: in general people do not just sMerit their buddies as shown by the averages; far from it.
It is true that one tend's to move in certain parts of the forum and reads certain topics that tend to be what one finds interesting. Those topics may have a larger presence of people that one merits and vice-versa over time, since the topics are of a common interest.
There is a difference between perception and reality at times. I recently has the feeling I was barely meriting new people out of my existing Merited Network, only to find my perception wrong by going over the numbers.