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Is Loneliness a Public Policy Problem? Zach McDade May 23, 2013 9 Comments Is Loneliness a Public Policy Problem? Shutterstock inShare3 Share Print Share on emailEmail Urban Institute MORE FROM THE URBAN INSTITUTE: The "Disconnected Youth" Paradigm Stemming the Tide of Federal Prison Growth The Continued Decline of North Korea Is a Case for Inclusive Politics A fascinating recent article in The New Republic reviewed a body of new science documenting the pernicious physiological effects of loneliness. Researchers have shown that loneliness-more formally, the want of intimacy-exacerbates a host of ailments, including Alzheimer's disease, obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, neurodegenerative diseases, and even cancer. The share of Americans who report "not feeling close to people" at any given time is 30 percent and growing, and deemed by some a social health crisis. Should public policy researchers and practitioners care about something as intangible and inaccessible as loneliness? I'll give you three reasons why I think we should. First, some background… Feeling lonely actually sends misleading hormonal signals that physically change the molecular structure of the brain. According to the article, this "wrenches a whole slew" of bodily systems out of whack, causing loneliness to be seen by some as a risk factor for death as great as smoking. Who tends to be affected by loneliness, according to this research? Women more than men, blacks more than whites, the less-educated, the unemployed, the retired, anyone different. In other words, many of the same people affected by today's long-term unemployment and wealth disparities, persistent poverty, and isolation. If loneliness exacerbates these ills, it will further diminish people's ability to engage in economically and socially valuable and productive activities, which in turn could exacerbate loneliness. Three reasons why loneliness should be a p

"THERE was a teenager in Arizona in the 1970s who "could no more imagine longing to touch a woman than longing to touch a toaster". But he convinced himself that he was not gay. Longing to be "normal", he blamed his obsession with muscular men on envy of their good looks. It was not until he was 25 that he admitted the truth to himself-let alone other people. In 1996 he wrote a cover leader for The Economist in favour of same-sex marriage. He never thought it would happen during his lifetime. Yet now he is married to the man he loves and living in a Virginia suburb where few think this odd. The change in attitudes to homosexuality in many countries-not just the West but also Latin America, China and other places-is one of the wonders of the world (see article). This week America's Supreme Court gave gay marriage another big boost, by rejecting several challenges to it; most Americans already live in states where gays can wed. But five countries still execute gay people: Iran hangs them; Saudi Arabia stones them. Gay sex is illegal in 78 countries, and a few have recently passed laws that make gay life even grimmer. The gay divide is one of the world's widest (see article). What caused it? And will tolerance eventually spread? Two steps forward and one back The leap forward has been startlingly quick. In the 1950s gay sex was illegal nearly everywhere. In Britain, on the orders of a home secretary who vowed to "eradicate" it, undercover police were sent out to loiter in bars, entrap gay men and put them in jail. In China in the 1980s homosexuals were rounded up and sent to labour camps without trial. All around the world gay people lived furtively and in fear. Laws banning "sodomy" remained in some American states until 2003. Today gay sex is legal in at least 113 countries. Gay marriages or civil unions are recognised in three dozen and parts of others. In most of the West it is no longer socially acceptable to be homophobic. Gay life in C

"Shortly after Prozac became the best-selling drug in the world in the early 1990s, I proposed that there was little or no evidence for efficacy, but considerable evidence that the drug would worsen depression and cause severe behavioral abnormalities. I attributed much of the problem to "compensatory changes" in neurotransmitters as the brain resists the drug effect. Since then, in a series of books and articles, I've documented antidepressant-induced clinical worsening and some of its underlying physical causes. Now the idea has gained ground in the broader research community and has recently been named "tardive dysphoria.""

The Civilizing Power of Disaster Where was all the chaos, looting, and mass-panic during Hurricane Sandy? By Katy Waldman|Posted Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2012, at 2:56 PM ET

"Westerners have internalized certain value systems-capitalism, individualism-that in some ways contradict our social wiring. Disruptive events recalibrate us to a "default setting," which is "altruistic, communitarian [and] resourceful." Solnit does not seek to minimize the grief and suffering crises can cause. Yet she believes that dealing with extreme situations helps us access a satisfying depth of feeling. Perhaps that's one reason why people farther from a disaster often are more terrified by it. (Another explanation may be that onlookers can spare the emotional bandwidth for fear, while those at the epicenter simply do what they must.) But meanwhile, the disaster myths persist. We expect anarchy when an emergency hits and get confused when civilization doesn't come apart at the seams. Part of the blame lies with the media. Sociologists Kathleen Tierney, Christine Bevc, and Erica Kuligowski have outlined "reporting conventions that lead media organizations … to focus on dramatic, unusual, and exceptional behavior, which can lead audiences to believe such behavior is common and typical."* Anomaly or not, a theft caught on tape makes for more compelling viewing than endless footage of rain. What's more, they argue, news outlets narrate disasters through a "looting frame." "

"There are many ways to read a book. One of them is to do so topless. That, at least, is the premise behind the Topless Pulp Fiction Club, a small group of young women who have taken to gathering in city parks to read their favorite works of fiction sans brassierre or any other covering."

"In a way, these discoveries are as consequential as the germ theory of disease. Just as we once knew that infectious diseases killed, but didn't know that germs spread them, we've known intuitively that loneliness hastens death, but haven't been able to explain how. Psychobiologists can now show that loneliness sends misleading hormonal signals, rejiggers the molecules on genes that govern behavior, and wrenches a slew of other systems out of whack. They have proved that long-lasting loneliness not only makes you sick; it can kill you. Emotional isolation is ranked as high a risk factor for mortality as smoking. A partial list of the physical diseases thought to be caused or exacerbated by loneliness would include Alzheimer's, obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, neurodegenerative diseases, and even cancer-tumors can metastasize faster in lonely people."

"Sitting down for more than three hours a day can shave a person's life expectancy by two years, even if he or she is physically active and refrains from dangerous habits like smoking, according to a study to be published on Tuesday in the online journal BMJ Open. "

"Sitting to Death? His clinic sees patients with multiple chronic illnesses. Nearly all of them sit for long periods each day. The term Sedentary Death Syndrome was coined by the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports in 2002 to address the growing consequences of a seated lifestyle. "There are studies on Sedentary Death Syndrome that show that sitting for hours can cause anything from lower back pain to high cholesterol, diabetes and obesity," he says. In other words, no matter what position you're sitting in all day, it is pretty bad for you."