Most of us know what it feels like to spend a quiet evening alone and not mind it. For others, that quiet has a weight to it. The difference between being alone and feeling alone may matter more for long-term health than researchers once thought.
A new study in Nature Communications of 277,489 British adults aged 40 to 69 found that people who were both socially isolated and lonely lost years of healthy life.
Men took the hardest hit on mental health. By age 50, men who felt both lonely and isolated lost about 5.8 years free from depression and anxiety. Women in the same group lost about 3.7 years.
Physical health was affected too, but the pattern flipped. Women lost about 2.4 years free of major physical disease, and men lost about 1.7 years.
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The research team at Tulane University followed seven big conditions. These were heart disease, diabetes, lung disease, dementia, cancer, depression and anxiety.
Loneliness and social isolation are not the same thing
The study separates two ideas that often get mixed up. Social isolation is objective. It is about how few people you actually see or talk to.
Loneliness is subjective. It is how dissatisfied you feel with the quality of your relationships. A person can have a large network and still feel lonely.
Healthy habits softened some of the damage but not all of it
The researchers also tested whether a healthy lifestyle could buffer the losses. They scored people on diet, exercise, sleep and whether they smoked.
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Healthier habits narrowed the loss in disease-free years tied to social isolation. They barely moved the losses tied to loneliness itself.
That makes loneliness look like a distinct risk factor. It is not something a person can simply exercise their way out of.
Lead author Lu Qi, a professor at Tulane University, said the effects were substantial. Social isolation and loneliness, he said, can meaningfully shorten the years a person spends free of both physical and mental illness.
About one in three American adults report feeling lonely
Loneliness is not a niche problem. About 32 percent of US adults reported feeling lonely in 2022, according to the CDC.
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The researchers describe their work as observational, which means it shows an association rather than proof of cause.
Among adults who reported loneliness, the CDC found that rates of frequent mental distress ran roughly three times higher than among those who did not.
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This article is made and published by Aksel Kryhlmand, who may have used AI in the preparation.