
Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely - evanagon
https://www.advisory.com/research/care-transformation-center/care-transformation-center-blog/2018/07/loneliness-epidemic
======
gwbas1c
Honestly, I've never had problems talking to random strangers. Some of my best
friends were random strangers at first.

IMO, the problem has nothing to do with the internet. Instead, the problem has
more to do with poorly controlling marketing and homelessness. Political
correctness also takes a toll.

When I lived in the Bay Area, most of the time I was randomly approached, "on
the street," it was from a homeless person. Thus, I was less likely to be
friendly to someone when I was in areas with high amounts of homeless people.
If the Bay Area took care of the homeless situation better, there would be
less people approaching me, and then it would be easier to interact with
strangers.

But then, what about being in stores, malls, ect? I then need to put up
defenses against aggressive marketing. That also makes it hard to be friendly.
If we considered unsolicited marketing as insulting, we wouldn't need to keep
our defenses up in places of commerce.

Even political correctness takes a toll. If I start talking with someone who
has a different opinion than me, or is a difference race than me, faux pas get
blown out of proportion. No one wants to make friends with someone who's going
to scream at them for being a bigot because they lean a little right, or be
labeled a libtard because they lean a little left.

~~~
dunpeal
> But then, what about being in stores, malls, ect? I then need to put up
> defenses against aggressive marketing.

There's aggressive marketing in the street too. Most often when someone
approaches me on the street, they're trying to get money out of me. Either
they're panhandlers, or they're selling me something, or seeking donations of
some sort - which are all really the same thing.

The only exception is if they want to influence me in some way, i.e. they want
my vote.

So ultimately, strangers approaching us in public areas are looking _to get
something out of us_. They're not looking for a reciprocal social
relationship. They're looking to get _something_ : money, votes, support for
their cause.

I do agree that it's a big part of the reason why Americans don't make social
connections in public areas. I'm not sure about the solution though. The
biggest problem in most places I lived was the panhandlers, and that's a big
problem that causes a lot of issues in general, and doesn't seem to have a
good solution.

~~~
wool_gather
> So ultimately, strangers approaching us in public areas are looking to get
> something out of us

This matches my experience as well (I suspect it might not in less urban
areas, though). It's quite frustrating.

I also resent the fact that the people who are accosting me like this usually
have the expectation that I _owe_ them my attention. I'm pretty good at
brushing them off/ignoring them, and I've seen quite a few get genuinely
offended that I'm evading their pitch. Which is offensive to me in turn:
they're trying to take advantage of my natural inclination to be
social/respond to another human, and _they 're_ mad because _I_ didn't fall
for it? It's a parasitic situation. Sadly, I also agree with you that there's
not really any way to fix it. The well is just poisoned...

~~~
dunpeal
> This matches my experience as well (I suspect it might not in less urban
> areas, though).

Indeed, I lived in less urban areas, and people are more open to socialize
there.

As for the rest, I agree and encountered the same as well. What they are doing
is parasitic, but they are naturally offended if you ignore them. For
marketers especially, consider that every time someone ignores them, it means
they failed at their job. It's a bad situation for them, and for us.

------
coryfklein
For a long time I've been wanting a "Tinder For Platonic Adults" app. I'm not
looking for romance or sex, but I want to find nearby matches with similar
interests; do you drink, play board games, are you married, how many kids and
what age?

There are likely tens of matches for me within a 5 minute drive, I just _don
't know how to find them_.

I'm a friendly guy and would love to have that friend that feels comfortable
stopping by unannounced or that I can share my latest batch of cheesecake
with. I'd love to have regular friendly gatherings nearly every weekend.
Literally the only thing stopping me is the first step of connecting. Once I'm
there I can easily deal with step 2: "dating" the field to find a decent
practical match with mutual interest in the relationship.

~~~
kudokatz
> There are likely tens of matches for me within a 5 minute drive, I just
> don't know how to find them.

I have found meetup.com to be exactly this. Not everybody at a meetup will
click personally, but they're much more likely to share interests. One meetup
group has completely changed my life, and I have met people I consider some of
the best people I have ever encountered anywhere. And they all live right near
me.

~~~
aylmao
I think a lot of this is economics, culture and the city-scape of the US. In
other places (my home country included) there's no meetup.com, but there's
just more community and family. Having lived in the US I've noticed the
following:

1\. Colleges get expensive and matter a lot, so people leave home for college
if they want to achieve. Time to make new friends.

2\. After college, a lot of people go where the job is-- this might be far
from your family and since you went to college with a lot of people from a lot
of different places, probably far from them too. Goodbye friends.

3\. It's not unlikely your job brings you to a city, and US cities are
notorious for having the tall downtown where most city life exists and the
quiet, expansive suburbs. You're young so you move downtown. Time to make new
friends.

4\. Downtown will be expensive, apartments will be for rent not sale, so
you'll be moving about constantly. You never form meaningful connections with
neighbors.

This point is interesting in that is, I feel, why people seem more glued to
their phones today, interact with people around them less, and overall annoy
each-other more. Their real friends are not necessarily the people around
them: they live on your phone. You don't make an effort to meet people around
you cause you might never see them again. Not even your neighbors: your lease
is for just one year.

5\. You eventually settle down and move to the suburbs. Time to make new
friends. Everyone wants the lawn, but this also means houses are far between.
How many people can your really interact with? Moreover, American suburbs are
just that: houses. No one walks on the streets of suburbs, so meeting, bumping
into and interacting with neighbors takes effort. All the time you spend
shopping, working, having fun-- it's probably going to be around strangers
downtown, not your neighbors.

6\. You have kids, and your kids leave for college. They're not going to move
back home, or to your neighborhood. They're going to go down the same path--
you better remind them to call.

7\. You get very old, and then get put in a elderly home. Again, instability,
and you probably have to find and make new friends.

A lot about this progression seems relatively normal but are unusual where I'm
from.

~~~
mannanj
I think a lot of it is denial and wanting not to admit it to yourself, or to
put up the appearance everything is ok. We can get pretty good at even lying
to ourselves.

~~~
aylmao
I agree 100%

------
Rotdhizon
I think a huge factor is the growing theme of social interaction being
unacceptable. Back in the day you could walk up to and make friends with
almost anyone, it wasn't weird to interact with strangers, thus making new
acquaintances.

Modern society stigmatizes that kind of interaction, don't talk to people you
don't know if you don't want to be ostracized. You could want to befriend
someone in a crowd, but come up with no good ways to go about the situation.
See someone wearing a cool jacket and you decide you want to be their friend >
Go up and introduce yourself > See almost every single person in the immediate
area turn and spectate the interaction, instantly judging you as out of the
ordinary. Really stretching the topic, even getting contact information is
more difficult these days. 20 years ago you could meet someone, and they'd
have no issue giving out their home telephone number. You'd ring them up and
you could schedule to see a movie. Nowadays you are considered suspicious if
you ask for someones phone number. I know people today that will absolutely
not give out their phone number to anyone other than immediate family.If you
are their friend and want to contact them, you have to do it over a social app
like IG.

That and it can be hard to find people you fit in with well due to the rise of
the internet and people staying inside. If you are a hermit and enjoy other
hermits, you won't find them by going outside. Which means you are then stuck
with trying to meet people online, and introducing yourself online is even
harder than it is in person and met with the same hostility. I'm talking about
guy > guy and girl > girl here. It's a whole different level of hell trying to
befriend someone of the opposite sex these days. Most people assume you either
want something sexual or unusual, not just friendship.

~~~
simmanian
I do think people tend to engage with strangers a lot less often than they had
"back then," but I cannot agree modern society stigmatizes that kind of
interaction at all. You can see people interacting with strangers on college
campuses, at music events, and at grocery stores all the time.

~~~
Fricken
Modern society doesn't overtly stigmatize social interaction, it encourages
social isolation at a structural level. Car dependent suburban sprawl is
designed to minimize the number of necessary interactions you need to have
with strangers to get through your day. As a society we've gone to great
lengths to avoid other people. The miracle of modern civilization is that you
no longer need to be a part of a community and cultivate a series of
interdependent relationships to get through life.

~~~
closeparen
Car dependent suburban sprawl maximizes the time that members of the same
family spend together, at the expense of interaction with strangers. Both have
their place in different phases of life. Many parents gladly give up
interactions with strangers on public transit in exchange for the extra hours
with their children that fast personal transport enables.

It’s a terrible place to live alone when young and single, but that’s not what
it’s for.

~~~
Fricken
Cars don't save any time. Mass transit, cycling and walking in a city
optimized for those modes is just as fast. It's also safer, cheaper, better
for mental and physical health, better for the environment, upward economic
mobility, and aesthetically nicer. The personal automobile is for signalling
status and avoiding poor/black people, which is worth more than all those
other things.

~~~
closeparen
No amount of bike lane makes you pedal 60mph. That assertion is clearly
absurd. Of course there are tradeoffs other than time, but people aren't evil
for valuing it.

To replicate the 25 minute commute times that are completely normal across
America's car-centric sprawl into a dense and transit-centric area, one has to
live in the most central and premium real estate. Great if you can afford it.
Most can’t.

~~~
Fricken
When everyone is going 60 mph, going 60 mph gets you nowhere fast. Going that
fast takes up a lot of space. To go that fast in cities we had to rip out the
places to go to make room for the means of getting to those places at 60 mph,
and for room to store your giant protective metal shell when you're not using
it.

We stopped building the sorts of places where you can still get somewhere
going at a reasonable speed around the end of WW2, and made it illegal, so
it's now very expensive to live in a sensible neighbourhood, there aren't many
left. It's a simple supply and demand problem, though not so simple once you
attempt to unpack the reasons as to why we have this simple supply and demand
problem.

There's a banality to true evil. It's a quirk of human social psychology that
when everyone is doing the wrong thing, it stops being the wrong thing. This
why rape=bad, and destroying the planet=pretty alright if you ask me.

~~~
closeparen
San Francisco's many single-family-home neighborhoods have all you really need
to accomodate car storage: garages instead of living space on the ground
floor. Houses still come right up the sidewalk and squeeze wall-to-wall
against each other.

Typical American suburbia takes density _way_ lower than that. People here
seem to value that separation for reasons above and beyond their parking
needs. For example, not hearing the neighbors' footsteps through the ceilings
or their TVs and family disputes through the walls. Giving each child their
own bedroom. Having room for play and gatherings in the backyard. This
suggests that, even without cars, we'd still insist on a pretty low densities.
(Since it is homeowners in the center who control land use in the center, the
frustrations of outer-ring commuters under such an arrangement don't make a
difference).

I'm fortunate that I can afford to live in a high-rise district and commute in
reasonable time by train and elevator. But even with so many places a short
walk from home, it's a big metro area - there are many _more_ I want to go
which are not so close. Without a car, I felt isolated and trapped. It's great
to have neighborhood businesses, but you get tired of the monotony after a
while.

------
eatorlaef
I've never had a relationship and I think over 30 it's really hard to find one
(especially if you never had one so don't have the "how to experience").
Everyone is either already married, or already divorced with kids, or just out
of your league. The married part also has another effect: you won't get
invited to a lot of events where people socialize, say a kids birthday party
where the parents also come together.

Also I think it's a personal thing but I don't even try to make contact with
anyone because of the whole climate of our society. Obviously it's divided and
that's really bad on its own but I think about things like mansplaining.
Basically you are reminded everywhere how bad it is and I agree on that but as
an anxious person it makes even more less willing to make contact because I
always have that thought of what if you are a doing something wrong, you will
be accused of something etc.

Yeah reading back my comment doesnt really make any sense but... I feel that
some people, some of us just meant to be forever alone for good or bad

~~~
jimmies
I've never had a relationship until 25. I had all the bad luck when it comes
to genetics and upbringing.

At the time of 25, I just learned to drive and had my first beater 15-year-old
car. I made lots of great friends when giving rides to Wal-mart to friends who
are fellow international graduate students on that shitty car. I just made up
bullshit reasons for me to go to Wal-mart every weekend and asked them if they
want to tag along. Many were too shy to bother others, and would totally
appreciate someone who would offer them a ride. I sort of became the go-to
person when people needed a ride (friendship came with a cost, who would have
guessed right?). One day, I was asked to give a student a ride from the
airport two hours away because she couldn't ask anyone else to help. We became
good friends after the ride I gave her and we developed a great relationship
two years after.

There is a lot of stuff like that you can do to help others and maybe help
yourself. You can volunteer in a place if you don't know where to begin. When
you find yourself to be useful and kind to others, oh strangely, people will
see that too.

>less willing to make contact because I always have that thought of what if
you are a doing something wrong, you will be accused of something etc.

While some people are a pain in the ass, you will find most to be friendly and
understanding when you're genuine. Don't be afraid of stories you read online
of judgments and lawsuits. I found myself in a strange situation when I just
had nothing to lose and I did many things against the advice to protect myself
from being vulnerable and potentially receiving the short end of the stick. I
have turned my life around doing just that. While I did indeed occasionally
receive the short end of the stick, I have gained so many great friends and
stories that totally made it worth it.

------
Nav_Panel
Incredible how the subtext here is "loneliness requires healthcare" rather
than, say, "loneliness requires coordinated social change". Almost as if the
goal is "how can we frame loneliness as an illness and reap some sweet
insurance money."

~~~
bertjk
I kind of agree with you, but what does positive "coordinated social change"
look like? I can only think of negative ones, like those that occurred with
radical political changes, or else explicit/thinly-veiled marketing campaigns
for consumer goods..

~~~
1auralynn
Redesigning neighborhoods to be walkable not driveable. Rezoning so that more
businesses can open near residential areas, so people can walk or bike to
work, walk to get groceries, etc. More people around leads to more
serendipitous interactions, maybe improved safety.

I guess that's not really coordinated social change, but I think tweaks to the
context in which we live can have huge, positive social impacts.

~~~
chiefofgxbxl
There's a nice virtue to this, also. Build walkable and bike-able places and
you're building public spaces to be _shared_. If you only embrace a car-driven
model of development, "public" spaces are to be _competed for_ (e.g. you stole
my parking spot, you cut me off, you're in front of me driving too slowly,
etc.)

------
grasshopperpurp
Many reasons for this, and many good ones have already been noted, but I
haven't seen anyone mention time yet. Americans work a lot. If you don't make
friends at work, or you don't maintain friendships from high school or
college, you're working on limited time and energy - as are the people you
hope to befriend (though you don't know who they are yet). If you have a
family, it's even harder.

I don't have kids, and while I don't have a ton of friends, I'm lucky to have
some good, close friends, who I don't (imo) have enough time for and don't get
to see enough.

~~~
lpcam33
One think that can lead to loneliness is material abundance namely the
abundance of houses. Here in Portugal we have 40% more houses than families.
For instance the building that I live has 8 apartments and it was build 60
years ago. I have some neighbors that live here since the beginning. They told
me there was a time it had 50 residents. Now there are only ten residents. We
are so surrounded by abundance that we are more and more apart from each
other. But we cannot stop building houses because that would mean less jobs
and the end of economic growth.

~~~
mjevans
I think the solution for your country may be the inverse of the one I
recommended for America in a different post in this thread.

The construction workers should become destruction workers driven by supply
side regulations aimed at keeping the price of housing 'stable' by encouraging
the retirement of the lesser quality housing and the conversion of those areas
to more socially productive uses. (Maybe parks, nature, or buildings more
suitable to society's needs.)

------
androidgirl
I'm 21 years old, I grew up online. I started on myspace and chat via gmail,
eventually moving to Facebook.

Fast forward through an early highschool graduation, and taking most college
classes online: I have no idea how on Earth I am to socialize with people in
the real world.

I quit and deactivated Facebook in January, and since I have felt so truly
alone. Each day I ride an uber to my dev job, work mostly by myself, then ride
back to my apartment. I speak with my coworkers, but all business, and rarely
speak with the drivers because it feels so awkward and strange.

To me, it feels like it's going to get worse. I am personally upset that my
abilities to connect with other people my age feels so stunted because of the
Web. And now, kids in this school district use smartphones in 6th grade.

A lot of this is likely bias, my mental health is really suffering, and I've
bounced in and out of therapy for awhile. So take it with a grain of salt.

~~~
Torwald
> rarely speak with the drivers because it feels so awkward and strange

If you decide to not do something just because it feels strange, you will
limit your growth in many ways.

Everything you haven't done very often feels strange.

Step out of your so-called comfort zone, make that a habit.

~~~
androidgirl
Entirely fair criticism and I am aware that the isolation I am in is self
imposed, at least to a degree! Thank you.

I am reasonably good at pushing myself at other things, like my career or
learning new things. I just need to take that step with my social anxiety as
well.

~~~
nshelly
Is there a form of exercise you enjoy? Even walking is fine. Put on a podcast
and go for a stroll (longer the better). Then afterwards, use the momentum and
sense of accomplishment to push yourself to try something "strange" or out of
your comfort zone. I think with Uber/Lyft drivers, I agree that the
conversation in the car is very fleeting, so it's important to invest and try
to build new relationships that will be more long-lasting (e.g. like a sports
club, board games group, book groups, etc).

------
agumonkey
Theory: human relationships can be hard, very hard, and any technology that
confuses one into thinking he can enjoy his time without the 'burden' of human
interactions is pushing this issue deeper.

~~~
ZeroBugBounce
I think of this theory like how lead poisoning works, where the lead can pass
through the blood–brain barrier and substitute in (poorly) for calcium,
causing all sorts of toxicity effects. Or how drinking sea water can fool your
throat for a second into thinking you've taken care of your thirst.

Online social interactions are plentiful and easy and often don't as quickly
or sharply trigger social anxiety. But they are a toxic replacement if you
don't get any real interaction with your fellow humans.

~~~
chillacy
The other day I raised my hand to high five a stranger in a dance event and
she didn’t notice and passed the other way. I remarked how I haven’t felt
something like that in awhile. Imagine if you had to watch everyone left swipe
you in tinder or reject your resume personally.

------
tinyhouse
There was a related discussion here a few months ago about the difficulty of
making friends after a certain age (40?). Here's my take on it, from someone
who immigrated to the US late in his 20s. My point of view is very biased
towards the region I live in, which is much more educated and wealthy than
most of the US.

Let's start with how kids grow up here since I think it affects their social
life later in life. American parents are protective. Most kids, even in middle
school, have very structured schedule where time with friends is usually not a
priority like academics. Playdates are usually organized by the parents and
they are usually short and not spontaneous. Kids who don't live in walkable
urban areas with good public transit usually depend on their parents to drive
them around to friends. I heard that in rural and poor areas it's even worse.
People never go to each other house, instead they only meet at the Church.

Now let's talk about American adults. Americans seem to love communities. They
are pretty involved in their communities which is great. However, they usually
stay away from forming deep relationships and exposing themselves. Sometimes
it feels like they don't want to be a burden on somebody else. Not sure
exactly how to explain it. My impression is that many Americans have friends
but usually not very close friends (at least based on my definition of close).
Maybe the size of the country and the fact the people move often is also a
factor.

------
Simulacra
I'm curious if this is a direct result of the internet and smartphones. The
two make us feel more connected, more global, but I think it makes us more
isolated. I miss talking to my friends on the phone, and hanging out in the
90s. Everything, especially how humans interact, is so digital today.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
> The two make us feel more connected, more global, but I think it makes us
> more isolated.

My wife and I had this discussion the other day. Messaging or posting on FB or
whatever is very flat. There's no depth to it at all. It doesn't replace
hearing a loved one's voice or looking into their eyes or hugging them or even
having a meal with them. When you go and you visit them and you see them, you
realize how much you're missing and, yeah, it feels very isolating to realize
that. Social media is a facade.

~~~
QualityReboot
Maybe so, but when I'm done with work, I hang out with my bros and play games
on Discord (before that it was Ventrilo/Mumble/TeamSpeak). It may not be face
to face interaction, but we're super social and it's great for us. We're
always meeting new people and having new voice interactions, which at least
for me, is as good (or better) than hanging out IRL. It's still nice to meet
up sometimes, but definitely not needed to avoid loneliness.

It's not like I touch my friends much when we're meeting up IRL anyway, and
voice is more comfortable to me than being on video (or being visible irl), as
I don't have to think about how I carry myself.

Tons of gamers do this and I don't think many of them are in the "lonely"
camp. I'm not sure why voice channels haven't seen wider adoption outside of
gaming.

------
evanagon
"Decades of research substantiate the devastating effects of social isolation.
Loneliness is equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day and increases the risk
of death by 26-45%, which is on par with risk factors such as high blood
pressure, obesity, and lack of exercise."

~~~
ronnier
It would be interesting to know if men are more lonely than women as
everything I've seen has shown that it's easier for women to join social
circles and find dates whereas most men struggle with this. As a result, I
wonder if this connects to the much high suicide rate for men.

~~~
nyokodo
Women attempt suicide at a rate 40 to 60% higher than men. Men on the other
hand die at a greater rate because of the greater use of lethal means like
guns etc. It still may be that loneliness is a greater factor in male
depression but gender differences in suicide rates are misleading indicators.

~~~
PurpleBoxDragon
I've always wondered just how reliable the suicide stat is because once
someone commits suicide, they are no longer able to attempt it.

It's kinda like how one has to be careful measuring people interviewing for
jobs, since someone who interviews poorly will spend many interviews before
being hired but someone who interviews well will only do a few (on average).
So measuring the average ability of the candidate in interviews will be worse
than the average ability of people who have been interviewed.

------
buzzert
I was listening to a podcast recently where this topic came up with regards to
the social pastime of jury duty. A man was being interviewed who lived during
a time before smartphones, and he retold that he really enjoyed going to jury
duty because it was a chance for him to get to meet people in his city from
all different backgrounds. There was a lot of waiting around, so people always
talked to each other out of boredom.

Now, whenever you go to jury duty and there's a waiting period of some sort,
everyone is of course on their smartphones. The reason for this isn't just for
the fact that there might be more interesting things happening on the web than
in the quiet courtroom, but instead it's because the smartphone generation can
"hang out" with people exactly like them 24/7\. To me it seems like a cold
optimization of your social graph aided by technology. It does some wonders
for loneliness (it's amazing that I can hang out with my friends anywhere in
the world at any time and they all have the same interests as me), but it's
also causing a lot of deep societal problems. Echo chambers, de-emphasis on
local affairs, an ever-widening gap of political viewpoints, and a horrible
"grass is always greener" psychological effect.

------
sicromoft
While loneliness is a real and important problem, there's good reason to be
skeptical about it being an "epidemic". The Cigna study is incredibly flawed:

[http://andrewgelman.com/2018/05/09/43-loneliest-number-
youll...](http://andrewgelman.com/2018/05/09/43-loneliest-number-youll-ever/)

Journalists (like David Brooks in the New York Times) are getting it very
wrong as well:

[http://andrewgelman.com/2018/05/16/no-no-epidemic-
loneliness...](http://andrewgelman.com/2018/05/16/no-no-epidemic-loneliness-
dog-bites-man-david-brooks-runs-another-column-based-fake-stats/)

------
CM30
A bit late now, but part of me wonders whether the advances in communication
technology have made it too easy to keep in contact with people we already
know, and whether that's caused part of this issue.

Think about it. In the olden days, if you went to college or moved to a new,
somewhat distant town or country, that was it for your current social life.
You lost contact with your existing friends, and you had to find new friends
at the new location in order to not be lonely again.

That lack of communication forced you to meet new people on a regular basis,
and likely made college/university a good place for it for so many young
people. After all, you couldn't talk to your hometown friends as easily now,
and your family was cut off too. You had to meet new people.

Smartphones and social media sites and other such things make it so you can
easily keep up with the people you already know, and spend all your free time
talking to those you're already in contact with. The need for finding new
crowds has basically died.

------
davesque
I know there could be a lot of causes for this but one thing I've noticed,
which is specific to my location, is that too much cultural homogeneity can
lead to loneliness.

I remember clearly a time in my life when I was very lonely and having a lot
of trouble meeting people. Eventually, I crafted a theory that most of the
people in my environment secretly did not want to meet anyone. This was either
because they already had busy lives or they just didn't need to know yet
another person who was just like them.

Shortly thereafter, I went back to university and encountered a lot of
exchange students who were perhaps legitimately in need of friends and perhaps
also coming from cultures which tended to be much less closed off to casual
friendliness. This fixed the loneliness problem for me very quickly. Of
course, it must also be acknowledged that the environment in university tends
to facilitate social activity.

------
wmichelin
Has anyone else noticed that clicking on this link causes them to be logged in
as "Pam" on the site? That doesn't seem great...

~~~
emiliobumachar
Might be a dark pattern. To nudge you to create an account to make the world
right again.

~~~
s73v3r_
That's what I was supposed to do? I just legally changed my name to Pam.

------
sxp62000
In NYC, where I live, I would never strike up a conversation with a random
stranger. The first thought that crosses my mind is, "oh they're probably on
their way to work", or "they seem busy on their phone", etc.

Our smartphones, tablets, headphones definitely make us less approachable. But
our attitudes towards work is also to blame. There is this culture of being
busy in NYC all the time, it's almost as if people take pride in it. This
probably shows in our body language too.

I feel especially alone on crowded trains. Everybody is staring at their
phones or trying really hard to not make eye contact. No wonder a lot of out-
of-towners feel NYC is an intimidating place and the people are rude.

~~~
throwaway427
I lived in NYC for ten years, bars are where you can talk to random strangers.
I had hundreds of conversations and met many people that way.

~~~
quotemstr
I used to live next to a bar. A few times a week, I'd take my laptop down
there, grab a beer, maybe order dinner, and code. Over a year or so of doing
that, I think maybe two or three people attempted to strike up conversations.
Now, that might be a side effect of working on a laptop, or it might be the
famously insular Seattle culture, but it still feels like a very low rate of
spontaneous personal connection.

Going by old movies at least, it seems like pre-information-age, you'd expect
to see far more social interaction in a setting like that.

------
prewett
We've designed ourselves into isolation. We leave our house in a metal box,
arrive at work, then return to our metal box. The most prominent feature of
newer houses from the street is the garage, not the door or porch. We live in
a subdivision where the nearest store is a five minute drive, so nobody ever
uses the sidewalks that are mandated to be there. We move across the country
for work, so we aren't close to family. There's no real neutral place where
people have to interact together for some reason, so you don't have the
accidental meetings that is required to meet people and community.

------
karmakaze
> 46% of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone

I would choose this answer but wouldn't say I'm lonely. 46% is no surprise.
What percentage responded usually/always lonely?

What is significant are the othet equivalent health risks.

------
GiraffeGlove
Not too long ago I listened to a really great podcast, The Lonely American Man
[[https://www.npr.org/2018/03/19/594719471/guys-we-have-a-
prob...](https://www.npr.org/2018/03/19/594719471/guys-we-have-a-problem-how-
american-masculinity-creates-lonely-men)] that I thought really hit the nail
on the head for a lot of men I know. Based on societal norms we men tend to
lose our ability to make friends as we grow beyond our teens and turn to our
female partners to arrange social activity for us.

------
nix0n
I'm surprised to learn that more than half of Americans rarely or never feel
alone.

~~~
massysett
Agreed; it is a ridiculous and alarmist leap for this piece to go from 46
percent “sometimes feel alone” to 46 percent are _lonely_.

One can be alone by choice and actually like it. “Lonely” connotates
depression resulting from being alone.

------
crispinb
A vast radical social experiment, replacing all human values with that of
competitive & monomaniacal accumulation of material wealth, turns out to be a
poor fit for actual humans. Well gosh.

------
awacs
The country being so politically polarized isn't helping. It's to the point
where most only want to socialize with people in the same "tribe". For better
or worse.

~~~
magduf
It's not great, and I think it shows our society is fracturing and collapsing,
but I don't want to socialize much with any Trump voters either. I have enough
problems; I don't need someone spouting insane conspiracy theories to me about
how 9/11 was "an inside job", Sandy Hook never happened, etc.

~~~
philipodonnell
> I don't need someone spouting insane conspiracy theories to me

Perhaps, but it may also help that person realize there are normal people in
real life who don't share those ideas, despite being told that anyone they
disagree with is a horrible person.

~~~
magduf
This is just like spending a bunch of time with religious zealots trying to
convince them their religion is wrong. You're wasting your time, and you're
just going to create more conflict. I have one Trump supporter in my social
circle and when conversations veer that way with her it's never productive so
I completely avoid it.

The bottom line is you _cannot_ use logic to convince people their religious
beliefs are wrong. Most rational people already know this about religions and
religious people, the problem is they don't realize that right-wing politics
(or any extremist politics for that matter) is also a religion.

Now before you try to argue that this only applies to the extremists, the
problem in this country is that the entire right wing in this country _is_
extremist. The only non-extremist position in this country is the mainstream
Democratic party, which is basically center-right. The Republicans have gone
full-on hard-right, so there's just no reasoning with anyone that buys into
that stuff.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The bottom line is you cannot use logic to convince people their religious
> beliefs are wrong.

You _can_ , but only if they are peripheral rather than fundamental beliefs,
and your chain of logic starts with their fundamental beliefs. Well, at least
as much as you can use logic to convince anyone of anything.

The problem (well, _a_ problem) is that you can't easily discern, from the
outside, a peripheral belief that depends on fundamental beliefs from a
fundamental belief which is rationalized in terms of other fundamental beliefs
(though circularity of support between beliefs is a pretty good sign that all
are fundamental and the support is mere rationalization.)

------
dunpeal
> Few providers have focused on the loneliest population: 18- to 22-year-olds.
> While typically a low-risk population, young adults experience rates of
> loneliness and social isolation far higher than any other age group
> according to Cigna's recent survey.

How is that the case?

18-to-22 seems like the easiest stage of adult life to make and keep friends.

These are the youngest adults. They go out regularly, meet each other in
public venues like clubs and bars, they're often actively dating, especially
now with the ubiquity of apps like Tinder.

Add to that the fact that they generally either just graduated highschool, or
are attending college. College is probably the easiest place to make friends:
you spend your entire life there with people your age who are intellectually
compatible with you.

I don't know how they did that survey, but in my experience 18-22 year olds
tend to have the most friends and active social lives of all adult ages.

Now, compare that to professionals who often have to relocate for work, and
find themselves in a new location where they know _nobody_. There aren't
really many social facilities to help these people make new friends.

So I really don't know how they arrived at the conclusion that 18-22s are the
loneliest ages. The older people I know, especially in their 30s and 40s, are
more prone to social isolation in every respect.

~~~
randcraw
You probably don't know them, but single/divorced retirees are probably the
loneliest folks. With no workplace to provide daily social exchange, unless
they belong to a church, meeting others in a social setting becomes a huge
challenge for seniors today. It's little wonder that the long venerated "joys
of being retired" are undergoing a major rethink these days.

~~~
dunpeal
Oh, yeah, I absolutely agree. Generally, as I become familiar with older
populations, the general rule seems has been that the older people get, the
harder it is for them to break out of the shell of loneliness.

When I left college and started meeting young professionals, they seemed far
more lonely than college students. Then when I started meeting older people in
their 30s, they seemed lonelier still. Now the loneliest people I know are
singles in their 40s.

The only exception seems to be that often people in their 30s get married, and
then they typically seem less lonely, at least while the marriage is working.

For singles, though, there seems to be simple linear correlation between age
and loneliness. So I'm sure when I get to know people in their 50s and 60s,
they'll be even lonelier than the 40 year old singles I know now.

------
mnm1
Do people still wonder why drug abuse is pandemic in America? Compound
loneliness with poverty ... Are people still wondering? Why the birth rates
are low and mortality so high? Seriously are people still wondering? Why we
are such a divided society, full of hate and fear of one another. People can't
be that fucking dumb in America. Maybe they are because they're still
wondering. Why we fight wars we can't win? Why we fight so hard to prevent our
neighbors from getting healthcare or education or help of any kind. No
seriously, are people still wondering why our kids shoot themselves in schools
and then when they don't do that shoot themselves up with heroin or worse? Are
you telling me people are so fucking dumb here that they're still wondering
about such things? Yeah, it appears the obvious escapes most people's common
sense. Only the truly stupid wonder about such things. It's not just
loneliness, it's lack of any kind of connection that drives people to do
insane things. Yet people still wonder why that kid shot up his school. Are
people here really that stupid? Yes they are.

------
m23khan
Internet is the culprit - as humans we have replaced interacting in physical
world with a digital world and thus the physical world is becoming more and
more of a barren place when it comes to social interaction. In modern society,
unless it is a dedicated club of some sorts or at a party or if it is pre-
arranged, social interactions just don't happen.

------
ThrustVectoring
Agriculture was a mistake.

~~~
mbrock
We should never have crawled out of the ocean!

~~~
acheron
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very
angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.

------
tc7
Are Americans outliers in loneliness? I know Pinker mentions this in
Enlightenment Now, but I feel like it's glossed over a bit since it doesn't
really align with his thesis.

I'm very interested in the reasons for this, though. Loss of community
structures without replacements? (Wider spread families for work, not going to
church...)

------
throw2016
Those who have had to move locations probably run into this the most. Usually
friends formed in school and college are from a time you were young and naive
and tend to have the deepest shared bonds.

And if you have to leave this behind getting the same level of social
connection can be tough. Also some people are extremely friendly by nature,
they love being around people and can engage easily, others are more reserved.
Work colleagues are usually in a weird space, not strangers but not really
friends.

Maybe human beings work best in known and close knit communities not urban
alienated environments, clearly a lot of our happiness derives from social
contexts, and we need that level of connectivity, interaction and support.
Sometimes you want to be alone, but the rest of the time you want to be with
people who love and care for you. Without it life becomes a bit empty and
alienation becomes 'normal'.

------
mendelsd
Loneliness, in my experience, can be a symptom rather than a problem in and of
itself.

I define my past loneliness as: Negative feelings, fed by:

\- feeling bad in the first instance

\- feeling powerless to improve my state

\- feeling that others could improve my state, if only they would show
sufficient interest in me

Gaining power to work on why I was feeling bad in the first instance (through
health and lifestyle interventions) has had several effects over the years:

\- it has improved my state so that I mostly feel good

\- it has taught me many valuable things to share with others

The social aspect of my life has radically changed:

\- I feel less dependent on others to feel good

\- I have many things to share with others and enjoy sharing it

\- My attitude and knowledge attracts others

\- I am mentally/emotionally stable enough to withstand the ambiguities and
stresses that relationships tend to give rise to

I don't claim to have solved loneliness, but I have solved _my_ loneliness and
I hope some will be helped by this insight.

~~~
lapaz17
How did you achieve it? What were the conditions to change your mental
status,opinions?

~~~
mendelsd
The conditions were an inescapable sense that something had been going wrong
with my life for a long time, and then getting very lucky: an acquaintance of
mine is a genius and sort of transitioned several years ago into being a
health guru, focused on addressing subclinical health conditions precisely
like the kind that had been bugging me. I had a lot of faith in him, worked
hard at it, and 8 years or so later am enjoying the benefits. Life is still
challenging, but it's great deal better.

The genius is Paul Jaminet. Check out his work if you think you might benefit.
I've also benefited from paying attention to the blogs of Chris Kresser, Mark
Sisson, and Scott Alexander (his health-related posts of course). Google
Scholar and Sci-Hub get huge credit too.

------
cwbrandsma
Long term effects of stranger danger writ large.

------
bariswheel
Being alone is a state, feeling lonely is a symptom that could be triggered by
it, but not necessarily. Important distinction here. Warren Buffett spent most
of his waking hours reading by himself. He's pushing 90. If you watch his HBO
documentary notice how he is very big on shutting his office door and reading
for the majority of his workday. If you are not peace when you are alone,
there is something else going on that needs attention, listen to it,
understand what might trigger that symptom and root cause it. Being with
someone else might be a stopgap to your symptom but not a cure.

------
brightball
I don't want to put to fine a point on this...but...good?

Loneliness eventually becomes a motivator to find ways to stop being lonely.
Usually that means improving yourself and coming to terms with some of your
own faults so that you can stop being lonely. Sometimes it means being nicer
to people. Sometimes it means making yourself get up the courage to go talk to
that girl over there. Sometimes it means trying to get in better shape.

There are a lot of side effects from it, but you have to decide you are going
to fix it and sometimes that means being lonely enough for it to no longer be
tolerable.

------
eswat
I see an article about this issue pop up every month or so. But what’s
actually being done about it? Seems like the solutions are not catching up
with the possible hurdles that get introduced.

~~~
jakegarelick
Alcoholics Anonymous helps with this for alcoholics. Generally friendships
have to be built on some shared interest or experience, so I think it would be
hard to create a solution for the general population.

------
narrator
What is the opposite of lonely though? Popular? Not to get all high school
angsty, but I bet popular people, of the Instagram famous people variety, are
much more popular than they would have been in previous eras given their
expanded reach. Perhaps this is the dark side of Internet fame: Increasing
real world obscurity for everyone else.

In previous eras, simple proximity counted for something. Now, it doesn't
matter and is even a negative with all the drama around workplace dating for
example.

~~~
grasshopperpurp
Companionship or fellowship would be the primary opposites. Popular people
don't necessarily have these, and they can still be lonely.

I was very popular in high school, and I have far, far fewer friends today,
but I'm less lonely because of the level of my friendships - to use my self as
an example.

------
sbilstein
My startup is trying to solve this problem for older adults. Seniors often
feel disconnected and isolated as their social structures change. Ayuda is an
service for finding senior-friendly events. We bring artists, educators,
musicians and more to an audience they may not have considered before. Events
are curated to be social and accessible for older people, not your typical
concert in a loud bar.

Check us out on www.ayudacare.com if you are interested in what we're about.

------
rellui
I think the increased efficiency brought by technology produced an ever faster
pace in work, social life, and just about everything else. It takes time to
talk and connect with another person which is getting harder to come by. Most
of the time, you're getting swept away doing work, looking at a post that just
showed up, reading the latest tweet by the president, etc.

------
austincheney
I suspect this is a growth trend largely resultant from intentional self-
induced social isolation. This problem is similar, in the brain, to addiction
in that the inflicted are incapable of perceiving the problem while the
implications are immediately clear to them.

------
pnathan
noted this elsewhere - but toplevel - if you are ever in downtown Seattle,
feel a bit lonely (work trip?) and want to get lunch or coffee with Someone
From The Internet, I am usually up for such a thing on a work day. email in
profile, etc.

------
maym86
The title:

> Nearly Half of Americans Are Lonely

Vs the actual result of the study:

> 46% of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone

I would have thought everyone feels lonely _sometimes_ and I'm more suprised
it is not higher. The title is clickbate.

------
irrational
I've noticed that most people have headphones on when they are out and about.
It's a lot harder to strike up casual conversations with people that have
headphones on.

------
kazinator
Schizos Are Never Alone

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfVowvsqYXg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfVowvsqYXg)

------
chiefalchemist
I find the smoking refence in the opening paragraph ironic. I'm what i would
call a social smoker. I can smoke and (thus far) not get addicted. But I
hardly smoke. It's mainly a "oh...you're going for a smoke...mind if I join
you...and bum one..." type of "habit."

It's away to have a brief moment of QT with someone. Taking it a step further,
I wonder how much __good__ bacteria used to be exchanged between smokers, that
also doesn't happen anymore.

------
pweissbrod
My guess is that America in 2018 is more selfish and cliquey than any other
time in memorable history. That simple really

------
diogenescynic
We are an incredibly divided country—whether by religion, culture, ethnicity,
sexuality, gender, language, etc etc. it’s a constant issue of us vs them.
Unfortunately, Trump takes complete advantage of this to divide the country
daily which only exacerbates the situation. I truly think this lack of
‘community life’ is killing Americans and the cause of a lot of other issues
like health problems and suicide.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
It's a vicious circle. This lack of community life also makes us more divided.
That in turn helps destroy community life...

~~~
diogenescynic
Completely agree. How do we fix this? I notice in other countries there is a
much more collectivist mentality, whereas Americans are rooted in a mentality
of rugged individualism. It’s hard to get Americans to actually care about
each other. For example, the Pacific North West is hostile to California,
Virginia looks down on North Carolina who looks down on South Carolina...
there’s a lot of divisions across as wide range of demographics in America. It
seems to be getting worse. Maybe the pendulum will begin to swing the other
way? A really sad symptom is how many people go on social media but
essentially broadcast to no one and get no feedback. It seems incredibly
lonely to realize how many people online are sort of engaging in form of
prayer of sorts (speaking to no one, hoping for a reply) and casting their
emotions into a black hole of the Internet.

I think for all it’s merits, we’ve gotta get people offline and engaging with
each other in the real world. We’ve gotta get people out of their thought
bubbles too, but I have no idea how to accomplish that. Bringing back the
Fairness Doctrine would probably help.

------
davidw
I miss Italy from that point of view. It's tough to make friends here in the
US.

------
avallark
At least its good to know that you are not alone.

------
fmfamaral
18 to 22 is the worst? Wow. That was unexpected!

------
claydavisss
Another sad downside to people fetishizing work...and the wealth that
apparently results.

Right now people are just alone and grumbling, but give it another ten years
and you will see this morph into alcoholism and/or drug abuse. Only a very few
will be happy in a society where every interaction is a dick-measuring contest
or chance to argue.

It's not too late to move to a hick town, find a spouse, pop out some kids and
go to church/temple/mosque (no one gives a shit if you actually believe, it's
about being around your neighbors). You will probably end up doing just as
well financially as tech workers in SF who are doomed to be lifelong renters.
You will definitely be happier.

~~~
sp332
I don't really get how moving to a more rural locale would make people less
lonely. Looks like suicides among young people are way higher there
[https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/...](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2195006)
and people there are about equally likely to report being "connected" to their
communities. [https://qz.com/1286591/urban-and-rural-america-people-
living...](https://qz.com/1286591/urban-and-rural-america-people-living-in-
cities-are-not-any-more-lonely-and-depressed-than-everyone-else/)

------
BloodyHands
these are fucking insane psychos

they should be hunted down and killed

these worthless fucks will piss and shit on anything

~~~
dang
We've banned this account. Commenting like this will eventually get your main
account banned as well, so please don't.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
aurailious
I know what half I am in.

