Loneliness 101: What You Need to Know (2024)

What is loneliness? It is the gap between the level of connectedness you want vs what you have. And its not the same as being alone. It is not the same as social isolation either. Loneliness is a subjective feeling. People can have many contacts and still feel lonely.

Loneliness is not all bad. In small doses, it is like hunger or thirst. It shows that you are missing something. But when that is prolonged over time, it can be deadly.

Here's why. The human being has evolved to seek safety in numbers. So it views loneliness as a threat. It triggers a flight or fight response. Your heart rate rises and your blood sugar and pressure levels increase in case you need more energy for a fight.

More inflammatory cells are produced to repair damage. You begin to view other people as potential threats not friends. And this creates a vicious cycle. 

You feel loneliness which makes you lonelier leading to strokes and heart disease even dementia, inflammation, poor immunity, depression and suicide.

33% of adults are lonely the world over. The highest number is in Brazil followed by Turkey, India, Saudi Arabia, Italy and South Africa.

Reports say loneliness causes more death than terrorist attack. It is as deadly as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. As lethal as consuming six alcoholic drinks a day. 

According to a study:

When people don't socialise, with friends or family, the risk of death increases by 39%. So does the risk of death from heart disease by 53%.

We live in a paradoxical world. Today the world is more connected than ever through social media, phone calls, WhatsApp groups, zoom calls you name it. But this is making us more isolated. Time with screens cannot substitute for time with humans.

One of the best strategies to tackle loneliness is simply be old school. Eat meals together and hold parties or events. The UK, Sweden, Ireland and Australina have adopted what they call a 'chatty bench'. A chatty bench is a park bench where strangers can talk to each other.

As a species, humans are not meant to be lonely. We have to form close connections the old school way. Playing a virtual ping pong or instagram reels does not count. 

@drfrank222

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Social Support

Best Evidence: A 2024 study published in the journal BMC Public Health determines the impact of loneliness on healthy life expectancy (HLE) and identifies ways to improve subjective well-being and health in a population of older adults. Using data from the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey, involving 15,500 participants aged 65 to 99, found that loneliness significantly affects life expectancy and quality of life. Lonely individuals live shorter, less healthy lives compared to their non-lonely peers. This study highlights the need for interventions to reduce loneliness, especially among older women, to improve their quality of life and health outcomes.

Another study that was part of the Cardiovascular Health Study, 5,749 adults aged 65 years and older from 4 US field centers for 25 years were followed. In older adults, higher social network scores are significantly associated with longer life expectancy and disability-free life expectancy. (Bhatia 2023)

Another prospective cohort study included 6,670 women from the Women's Health Initiative Memory Study who were cognitively unimpaired at enrollment; showed that improving social support may reduce risk of MCI (mild cognitive impairment) and dementia in older women. (Posis 2023)

Okinawa in Japan, Sardinia in Italy, Roseto in Pennsylvania, Loma Linda in California, Icaria in Greece and Nicoya in Costa Rica are some of the places with the highest proportions of people who live to be 100 years old.

All these places have the same thing in common. What is it?

In the 1950s, Roseto, Pennsylvania, shocked the medical community. From 1954 to 1961, Roseto had nearly no heart attacks for men ages 55 to 64. And for men over 65, the death rate was half of that of the U.S. average.

Dr. Robert J. Waldinger, a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, conducted the longest scientific study on health and happiness in history, the Harvard Study of Adult Development. 

According to Prof. Waldinger:

We had more than 40 years of data. We began to find that when we looked at our 80 year olds, and we looked back at what we knew about them when they were 50, that the strongest predictor of who was going to be happy and healthy at age 80, was the quality of their relationships at age 50.