What I take from this article is that social interaction is extremely important to ones health, and it's something that we largely taken for granted. In the age of computers and secluded work environments, I think we need to be aware of the effect that even casual interaction has on our mental and physical health. I have some personal/anecdotal experience which back this research up and affirms my belief that communication and interaction with others is vital.
I've been working from home for a number of years. During this time I've on average spoken with and interacted with 1 person every day - my wife.
I occasionally go out, occasionally see family members, but the majority of my day-to-day work is quiet, alone, working at a computer.
- I have been more sick in recent years than ever before in my life. This is even compared to previously living in a major city and taking public transportation.
- I have been experiencing sharp mental decline especially in the last year. Solving complex problems is much more challenging.
- My memory is suffering. Even my wife has begun to notice, I forget little things and have developed an "aloof professor" disposition that wasn't natural to me.
- I now find social interaction more difficult. I'm more akward, and find myself over-thinking previously natural interactions.
- Lastly ... I'm far more depressed. I just don't enjoy much these days. I wake up, work, don't talk to many people.
The TLDR here is that I urge everyone to tend to their social garden. I let mine decay for too long, and I'm paying the price now. I am beginning the process of restoring connections, and getting out more, and I'm already noticing an improved mood.
Oh and I should mention - I'm naturally an introvert so this reclusive lifestyle was all too comfortable for me.
I went from very brutal environments (massively stressful jobs in algorithmic trading, generally sitting on loud trading floors with late hours, weekends, etc) to working remotely and found almost the opposite.
Instead of being sick several times a year- we would literally watch colds and other illnesses work their way up and down the rows, I instead got sick maybe once a year.
Solving problems in a nice quiet room with no coworker conversations around me improved my ability to concentrate and do the hard things 10x.
Social interaction is a mixed bag. My last two jobs I was surrounded by a bunch of people who hated their work, and we only really bonded over the fact that we would rather be literally anywhere else. My remote coworkers all get along great, and it would be nice to spend more face time with them, but I have an active personal social life so that helps.
I think you are missing a big piece here though- and that's activity. I take my dog on long walks and generally like to bike around town (I live in a city) but it requires much more of an active effort. Luckily I eat a lot better and much less than I used to. I don't keep junk food or really any prepared foods in the house.
The quality of social interaction is very important. None of the relationships you described seemed overly healthy. The study shows that it was good, warm, reciprocal relationships that factored into improved mental health. I work on a trading floor as well, and while I do enjoy it, I put in lots of work to have healthy social relationships outside of work.
These studies try to point out that things are binary, but its not of course. You have to remember what they are measuring in general, stable vs. unstable. For example, drinking is bad when it becomes destructive. Two-three bottles of red wine per week is ok, unless you do it to forget things.
I have suspected for some time that my problems were due to social isolation, but I have been too apathetic to make an effort to do anything. You've just given me the motivation to change that. Thank you!
At some point I thought there should be an app for lonely people to get know each other. but I am a bit afraid that being lonely is much more difficult to admit to even oneself than being single, so I started thinking that the app should not be about loneliness, but about things to do or help needed in simple things. So I guess it should be something remotely resembling twitter that is geographically filterable. so that you could "tweet" things like
"We need one more person to our game evening, anyone nearby? #Games"
"I am driving to Los Angeles. Ayone need a ride? #Rides"
"Need more potatoes for our #food. Bring some and come to eat"
Obviously you would also need to figure out a way to keep creeps civilized and a currency/counter to keep the small asshole minority just taking advantage of others help.
At the IT company I used to work at, our CTO constantly raged over people asking for technical solutions for their own management problems, which is a pattern I have internalized. Sometimes things are social issues that need to be solved socially. I don't think there is going to be a systematic way to keep creeps out and prevent the asshole minority, people are just going to have work things out as a society.
I think it is quite difficult to let complete strangers to your home without any help from technology. I don't think this app would need any rocket science, but I would guess that a simple way to verify who you are dealing with and make that public ("John Doe is joining our board game night today") and some kind of scoring system ("John Doe has wanted help x times and given help y times and on average people do not seem to think he is an asshole")
But I think the crucial point is that if you want to fight loneliness, it is difficult to do that if the lonely one is made to think that he is now getting something because he is lonely. That will instead make him feel worse. It would be much better to tell to the lonely one that hey, just you, I would need your help. (Complete amateur psychologist writing here)
Perhaps having mandatory face shots being part of the app (you can at least know what age demographic the strangers are in) as well as a blacklist (preferably hard to get on to avoid abuse). I would want to avoid a scoring system, that slips into "good person" quantification territory. For the second point I agree with your concept, but I don't have an idea for the implementation. Random matching?
Maybe some combination of real name, photo, social media accounts and trusted networking (these are the people that I have verified to being what they say they are etc.)
Scoring has its challenges, but somehow I think there should be a way to flag people that do not behave decently. Maybe just two grade scoring with wording that makes it clear that the lower grade is applicable only if the person has e.g. threatened with violence or completely disregarded what was agreed (being a bit late or politely cancelling in the last minute is not sufficient)
And for the second part, I just thought that it would be enough to get a notification on your phone that someone nearby could use some help that you can give. Not probably a perfect solution that saves every lonely soul, but if even a few, that would not be bad. And of course, maybe also some of the not so lonely ones get to receive or give some help.
Wow, you've put some good thought into this. Being able to say "I could use help taking down a tree" would be great - signing up and attending an event is one thing (meetup.com), but hard to do if you're down. But actually being needed and being able to help! THAT is powerful! Please do this. I'll help if I can.
There are a few problmes here. first one is that I have currently my hands quite full. Second is that for a successful launc, I guess a good idea is about 1%, technical MVP is another 1%, execution of everything else maybe 18% and pure dumb luck 80%. Here, even if I had time to come up with the MVP (and honestly, I am very sue that there are people reading this that would come up with the MVP in a fraction of time than it would take me), there is still the 98% left that I am really bad with.
I am open to discuss about this further, though, if there are people interested in taking a lead. (Ideally I would see this built as a open source client on top of some distributed data store and not a for-profit thing, but that probably is way too idealistic)
I've been on Reddit and seen how many people are truely lonely. If this app could reach critical mass, it could have a hugely positive effect on thousands (millions?) of lives. I hope you (or someone) will do it. I'm not lonely, but I would use it too - everyone can have more friends.
I also recommend it, and cannot see anything wrong in going to tech/networking meetups, it should be anything you are interested in and won't feel out of place attending.
There basically is. Meetup.com does what you are looking for.
People without any common interests are boring to spend time with. You need at least something in common.
I move all the time and every time I move to a new city I try to find a board game group and a Linux User Group.
I'm not super into Linux anymore (I used to be a Systems Administrator) but I can help new users and the people are geeky and people that I often get on with. In the past I have joined Toastmasters groups. They are good with a much more varried group of people going to them. The point is the people then connect you with other people.
The best way to meet people is not "I'm looking to meet people" – because then those events and spaces get filled with social outcasts and creepy folks.
The best way to meet people is to look for activity groups, meetups and so on. People with common interests. I'd even argue that this is actually a better way to find romantic partners, than to signal "I am looking for a romantic partner" (unless you're above-average in attractiveness).
An app for friendship sounds too broad. I've tried meetup.com a few times, but all the events seem to take place while I'm at work (I'm pretty much night shift), so that didn't work out. I'd suggest finding a community that interests you, and looking for a local meetup.
For example, there are tons of video game forums out there, but if you focus on one game, the pool gets smaller, but more tight. I've met a few people IRL playing Destiny, and tons more online. Maybe someone else has more suggestions!
As I commented above, I lived through this exact experience, and moving back to office work had a huge impact on my overall happiness. That and Vipassana meditation.
I'd say that because of the kind of work that many here do, the onset isolation/neglect of friendship networks is more obvious than in other occupations. That means people here will notice the situation more quickly and be able to take sensible proportionate steps.
I work as a teacher, so in a normal week I have lots and lots of high bandwidth face to face engagement with hundreds of people. I've seen people retire from teaching and suddenly discover the relative atrophy of their non-work networks, and I'm taking steps to avoid the same experience.
You mention that this is anecdotal, anyway, but stress to yourself that it is anecdotal.
You sound depressed and you mention that social interaction might be the cause, but is it not possible that you are finding your work unfulfilling, that's causing depression and the rest follows?
I only say this because I've worked long stretches more or less alone with limited social interaction (didn't have a wife around) and didn't suffer any of those symptoms, but that's an anecdote for you. I did suffer those symptoms when depressed, though, and that didn't take solitude.
Some people are very happy with solitude and there's no hard rule that it affects everyone the same.
Yes, I would caution anyone who reads my post from drawing a 1:1 correlation with their life. That has strictly been my experience and even as such, I of course can't be 100% sure about the origins of my current situation. It's a bit of a chicken/egg situation.
Yes, right now I struggle to find fulfillment in my work. But did that develop because of solitude which induced depression or did the lack of fulfillment develop naturally and cause the depression itself? It's difficult to say for sure, even as the person experiencing it.
I can only speak to what I know of myself and my situation.
I was a developer for ~3 years before I started WFH, and never felt like this. The product I worked on then, wasn't any more interesting than the current one. It's true though that the first few years of work carried with them a novelty and enjoyment that was bound to fade. But I think my happiness then was more than just that. Even off days felt successful if I was interacting with the team.
> Some people are very happy with solitude and there's no hard rule that it affects everyone the same.
Definitely agree. We're all different, and some people surely do thrive in this kind of environment. Interestingly, I would have told you I was one of those people. I'm naturally an introvert so this lifestyle was very comfortable at the outset. Too much of a good thing though...
Its not too late! Socialize more, exercise everyday, and take something for depression! Learn new things, I had a rough spell a few years ago which took its toll. Now what I find is I have to walk the razors edge everyday. Make sure I sleep enough, eat right (low carb and fasting), exercise twice a day. If I dont I start to lose the edge.
I really wish there were good community organizations that bring people together like a church, but weren't religious based. I guess that's what organizations such as the Moose lodge, or Lions club attempt to fill?
Religion is a non starter for me but I would like to find some community groups doing good things with good people.
I know about meetup.com etc but I'd like to have ties with something a little deeper. Preferably something without political and especially without supernatural overtones.
I see there being a big need for this in the modern world.
I find that sport fills this function for me. After being a very cerebral, non sporty child I was lucky enough to find sports I really enjoyed (badminton & tennis) in my late teens.
When I've moved from city to city I've joined a good local badminton club and played in local leagues. With that has come vigorous exercise AND social interaction. Latterly its also brought the opportunity to contribute to local community through coaching my club's juniors. I find this challenging in a very rewarding way.
Even if you are not religious, you may want to reconsider church. It can be good for people and communities in many ways, and often for reasons you don't understand.
Sometimes I feel like American culture is being sterilized. Just like white bread and a multivitamin, we only take what we understand and leave everything else behind. And then when we encounter social problems after eliminating church (or health problems when we eliminate natural foods), we are puzzled.
But most importantly from my perspective I see the fundamental basis being at odds with what I understand to be reality.
I'm not saying churches don't fulfill an important function, they do. But the order of things changes and even though change can bring a period of chaos we generally don't go back, we go forward.
What we know as "churches" are not growing, they are dying. For whatever reason(s) and this trend probably isn't going to reverse. So for me the solution is to move on to something with equivalent functionality but with less dysfunctionality.
I wonder if the "next thing" is going to come from atheists constructing such an organization from scratch, or from religious people adapting churches to fit our new understandings?
I think I see your point and it's a fair one, militant atheists are usually too busy being just that to be constructive but we aren't talking about cool electric guitars at the pulpit and admitting a few gays.
What I see being different in evolution this time is that it isn't an issue of whether God and Jesus are the same being or different beings or whether the Pope is the mouthpiece of God or the King is or Jesus or Muhammad was the last messenger. It's a whole different understanding, one that doesn't generally accept the existence of supernatural forces. So it's a foundational issue this time. I just see the non acceptance of the supernatural continuing to grow in the world and don't think it will roll back (may be wrong but don't think so, at least in my lifetime). So some important things get lost. Meh, anyway, enough about that. I don't fault anyone for being religious, I just simply can't be.
You might consider the Unitary Church, they are a non-denominational church, which means even people who don't believe in religion can join. The few that I have been to would pretty laid back groups of people who were just trying to understand life.
Maybe religion could transition slowly away from supernatural to "living with forces outside of your control". And away from heaven and hell to some notion that being good is its own reward, and good for your descendants.
Your logic is flawed associating social problems with eliminating church. There should be more socially accepted ways to congregate other than under the auspices of an ancient superstition.
And I won't even comment on your connection to health problems and natural foods (whatever those are). You mean like what prehistoric man ate? And lived to 25 years old?
My point was that sometimes something may have a positive effect even if we don't understand why or where the positive effect comes from. We can't easily reproduce the positive effects of church because we don't know what about it, exactly, is responsible for the benefits.
Similar to how a multivitamin and junk food doesn't replace a balanced diet. That's just an analogy to help illustrate my point, not a point on its own.
I think it's more likely that churches will adapt to our modern understandings than someone will build the perfect atheist social institution from first principles.
Join your local Go Club - they're always looking for new players. Mentally stimulating and in my experience Go players often work in an IT-related field. Play Go and you will find new friends worldwide.
For real, I'm not trying to be cute. Unless you're pronounced clinically depressed by a couple doctors, one should avoid the official benzo & related "happy pills".
One thing that might help, is try to make some hippy friends. You're not expected to become one of them, but they have a lot to share, wink wink.
The problem with medication for depression is that they generally have only ever been proven to help in cases of severe depression. They don't help with mild depression, but doctors are allowed to prescribe them for anything they see fit. I believe they have been over prescribed.
There are related issues, like racing thoughts and anxiety, which are different and not all that uncommon. Lorazepam is actually pretty effective for these issues.
There is lots of evidence for lots of different diets being healthy, people have different dietary needs. However those things are pretty universally good ideas.
Obligatory quick google links:
In the last six months I've moved to a new apartment in another part of town, I changed jobs, and I graduated from grad school. My social life has been severely disrupted! The change in work was maybe the most dramatic since I moved from a highly social environment to being isolated in an office by myself (and on a floor with taciturn colleagues). It's only been a few months, but I already see some mild forms of the symptoms described in the parent comment.
Now, being in grad school, working full time and having a toddler did a lot of the work in atrophying my social connections over the last three years, but this spring delivered a knock-out blow. Luckily, I'm attentive to my mental health and generally a proactive person, so I've outlined steps to try and at least get into another job (Cracking the Coding Interview... groan). I've also started scouring the internet looking for ideas to start developing my community ties:
- Our local YMCA has programs for families that we'll be taking advantage of, including free babysitting once a month(!!!)
- There's a local collective of volunteer "civic hackers" that I'll start hanging out with after summer's over.
- I just saw, somewhere above in this comment thread, a mention of meetup.com. It's now open in another tab.
- I'm even leaving comments on the internet, such as this!
I had this exact same experience. It was detrimental to every aspect of my life. Moving back to office work was one of the best decisions that I've ever made. If not the best one.
Before I started working from home I used to consider myself an introvert, who was good with/preferred being alone. But that was always against a back-drop of living a relatively social work and home-life. Once I started working from home my tendencies towards introspection, and insulation, which were tempered by my social life, became dominant and I ended up becoming insidiously depressed without even noticing it.
Change your job/workplace man, it'll change your life.
After college, I had a NEET period of roughly 6 months. I would see friends maybe once every other week because I was somewhat depressed about not being able to find a job and had to be dragged out of the house, and the only people I spoke to regularly in person were my parents. I went to my first meetup (for programming) towards the end of that period before getting my first job, and I felt all of the stuff you described.
It was really jarring, but I knew what was going on, so I didn't freak out. I'd read about how solitary confinement affects peoples' intelligence, especially their ability to formulate speech, and I figured I had a diminished version of that which only took effect when talking to strangers. It took about a week of work and interacting with people other than my parents on a regular basis for me to feel normal again.
Do you exercise on a regular basis? I think I've learnt from Coursera's Learning How to Learn that interaction with people and exercise have similar effect to our brain cells, that both will help generate new cells (I don't know the details, but you probably get the idea).
So that's what I figure how to keep myself sane if I would enter a period of almost-to-none daily interaction with people.
The one probably can't replace the other, but I'm curious if you would still have those symptoms with regular exercise.
It's frightening how accurate this describes my situation as well. Went 3+ years working at a startup where essentially we were one giant family, everyone hung out after work, and I rarely had time to myself. Everything technical was super easy to digest, I was exercising every other day, and I was on top of my game.
Now most of my days are spent working from home, and the only human interaction are the cashiers at the grocery store. I'm tired all the time, focusing is difficult for me now, and I feel like I've become slower with anything that requires mental effort.
What's the solution here? Don't work from home? Hang out more?
you pay small price to get intense focus whatever that small price may be. go isolate yourself in a room or go to a library or co-working space. take a long pensive walk.
I often come across similar comments and they scare me. I share a lot of similarities and I am only in my early twenties. I decided to take a gap year and take part of an exchange program abroad.
Thanks for the heads up. This is something that I've wondered about with working from home. I think I'd like 1 or 2 days per week at home and rest in the office for ideal ratio.
I've been working at home on Monday and Friday, with the other days in an open-plan office, for the last twelve years. Its a good ratio that works well for me.
Yikes. I'm just about to start a new job working from home fulltime. My wife's been expressing her concern that the lack of social interaction might be difficult for me, I guess I better heed her and join up with some sort of social group (was thinking musical theatre)
Don't worry too much, each person is different. I am WFH'ing for a good several years now, and largely enjoy it. Also, I believe, in my case pros outweigh the cons.
Lucky to have a family, which does help a great deal in this situation. But, I do sometimes worry about it, but as a result compensate for it - exercising to stay fit/lean. Also, always try to be on the cutting edge of tech - HN/similar is great for that.
Edit: Just to add two more points:
1) Social networks: One might think, that they will help in this situation. But again, its different for everyone. I find, in my case their use is detrimental. So after having disconnected from them totally (save a pseudonymous twitter a/c for news/venting), I find it more peaceful, also I found my friendship with good friends has improved. And Facebook friends withered off.
2) Another thing, I learnt a few years ago, some people need social interactions to re-energize where as for some people it is solitude. Are you the type, who if goes for a walk in the park, and when people try to hold a long conversation, do you like it? Or would you rather be left alone after greeting/short-conversations. I definitely, am the second type. (If I am portraying my personality to be totally anti-social, then that's inaccurate. As my social needs are fulfilled well, by family and friends. May be if I had less of that, then would definitely like to have long talks with strangers in the park. Each person has different situation and needs, that's the key point).
Having done musical theater as my main hobby for almost 8 years I can thoroughly recommend it for that exact purpose. There's something about singing with folks and sharing a stage that leads very quickly to strong deep social bonds. It's also a nice contrast to my tech friends I find.
By spending most of your time at home, your immune system probably dials down.
I noticed I was falling sick when I took a short break from work and was mostly home. Everything returned to normal once I resumed my normal work schedule.
You should probably check your home for toxic materials, especially if that's an old building. Short stay at home shouldn't affect your health or more so immune system.
Working from home messes you up in more ways than you notice. One is that you tend to eat more and the other thing is it can stress you your will power bencause ther are so many distractions. One last thing is you move walk around as much as you do, your brain needs blood flowing, oxygen. Ever heard of drowning causing brain damage? Extreme analogy but that's because of lack of oxygen, I'm sure less than optimal oxygen can't be as good
Just like children's IQ and foot size are strongly correlated the answer in their and in your case can be just attributed to age (you said "I've been working from home for a number of years").
Not saying that's the solution but I'm glad you said it's an "anecdotal experience".
I haven't read the paper yet but on first glance it looks like an observational study. I know it's cliche but correlation does not imply causation and observations are just that, drawing conclusions after facts.
I'm having the same experience. I have been working on my thesis for the last year. My university is in a different city, and everyone working on something related is in another country. This made it hard for me to make progress and this has had the effect of me isolating myself even more (I haven't made enough progress to have a beer with friends and not feel bad about myself).
Although I have never been sick for the last year, I recognize all the other symptoms to some degree. For an assessment, I took an IQ test a while ago. I used to be really good at number sequences, acing them or at least getting 95% right. I think I got about half of them this time, which was quite shocking.
Once I finish this thesis (my supervisor keeps trying to convince me to postpone my graduation - a student working on a very similar problem has spent more than 2.5 years now, and has not graduated yet) I want to spend more time on my social life again.
I find this perfectly credible because almost exactly the same conclusions were stated by Putnam in the classic _Bowling Alone_ [1]. A couple of pull-quotes from that,
> Dozens of painstaking studies... have established beyond reasonable doubt that ... [t]he more integrated we are with our community, the less likely we are to experience colds, heart attacks, strokes, cancer, depression and premature death of all sorts...
> ... the positive contributions to health made by social integration and social support rival in strength the detrimental contributions of ... risk factors like ... smoking, obesity, elevated blood pressure, and physical inactivity.
> ...as a rough rule of thumb, if you belong to no groups but decide to join one, you cut your risk of dying over the next year in half.
Putnam was surveying a large number of studies, not just the Harvard one.
I've got a simple hack I employ when in a new city. All through my twenties, I moved basically every year or two. Most of the time I had a network of family or associates to drawn upon before arrival. But often, I'd find myself a complete stranger, knowing not a single soul.
What I'd do is this: find a local diner, not a touristy place, but a real local institution and landmark. And then eat dinner there every single night at the same time. If constrained budget wise, look for the early bird dinner specials. Become a regular. Trade gossip with the wait-staff, complement the cooks on their sublime creations, chat up the little old ladies, engage the workmen about their craft. After a few weeks you'll find yourself invited to birthday parties and have the opportunity to give back your own time and energy, shovelling a driveway or helping out at a food drive.
A summer time variant: farmers markets. They typically have the same vendors every week and will remember you if you purchase a quart of organic honey and ask with genuine interest questions about their practise. Offer to get them started on Facebook / Shopify. Pretty soon, word spreads and you're no longer a stranger in town!
This also works in places like gas stations (try to visit the same ones), grocery stores if you go 1+ times a week, and sometimes coffee shops and fast food joints, especially in smaller towns.
It takes a little longer, but a popular walking path can grant good results as well. Basically anything routine where you are likely to run into the same folks over and over.
This is also the trick to building healthy online communities, running into the same people over and over again. It's the difference between a toxic flamewar culture and a positive supportive culture.
Sand Volleyball and volleyball classes for anyone remotely coordinated. Best way to meet young and healthy people with plenty of the opposite sex as well.
I don't know the nuances of this study but I am curious about the role of personality. I have lived much of my life with large groups of caring family and friends and I was miserable. I have lived parts of my life as relatively isolated and reclusive and was enormously happy. Have any related studies accounted for personality? 5,10,20% of the population might be the exact opposite?
Seems like you fit the study's findings quite well actually:
"The surprising finding is that our relationships and how happy we are in our relationships has a powerful influence on our health."
You can be surrounded by "caring" family and friends that you don't have a lot in common with, and that can be miserable. Getting determined but bad/outdated advice from parents is a classic and widespread example. It's not that the parents don't want the best for their now-adult kid, it's just that they're simply ignorant of the best way forward. But they're convinced that they're right and that creates friction despite good intentions.
I have an anecdote of this from literally yesterday(and it's personal enough to be a throwaway).
Status from my 20s to early 30s: at home, occasional small gigs, not much steady work or career prospects. I got badgered with "we worry about you" or "maybe you should get a second job" all the time.
Status as of yesterday when I reported that I had successfully speculated several hundred thousand dollars through multi-year cryptocurrency trades: Wow, that's great, you should diversify your wealth and marry someone now. The dinner table conversation was relaxed for once.
Which is still them imposing a narrative on me, but it's one I feel a lot more able to negotiate than the money question, where any plan or project I announced was simply met with further doubt, dismay or disinterest. They didn't want to engage with the prospects or pay attention to anything but results and it was leaving me constantly gloomy and self-doubting and frustrated with them.
And I don't think it's exactly that the money itself is making me happy, since I'm pretty spartan in my lifestyle - I'll go out for coffee drinks most days and that's my biggest and most common indulgence, but I don't spend on big luxuries or travel more than once every year or two. It's the side effect of the story changing to "I'm not totally dependent anymore, I'm free to do what I want right now" and subsequently changing their outlook.
>Status as of yesterday when I reported that I had successfully speculated several hundred thousand dollars through multi-year cryptocurrency trades: Wow, that's great, you should diversify your wealth and marry someone now. The dinner table conversation was relaxed for once.
Don't know about marriage, but definitely diversify your wealth...
A loving and caring wife definitely makes you happy. You also need return the favor. I was always afraid of Marriage but pulled the trigger one day. There's some truth to the advice.
When you buy a Kia and it breaks it's "unreliable".
When you buy a Ferrari and it breaks it's "temperamental" or "quirky".
A Toyota may cost a pretty penny and be more reliable than the Kia but the Ferrari looks much better in your garage and is much more fun to take for a spin.
It is tough, if not impossible to know for sure in cases like these. The most effective way is the use of controlled studies. The population is split such that the only difference between the groups is one variable. The very simplified version is that sometimes you find that there is only evidence for a correlation (between say relationships and good health), and other times you can find evidence for causation.
I can't find a link but there was an article here recently where researchers had concluded strong relationships contributed to better self control and thus had a knock on effect on health.
this isn't really a useful point. social sciences necessarily rely on this kind of research because you can't do a controlled trial on people's long-term behaviors really.
If you like this you may also enjoy "The Village Effect" by Susan Pinker[1]. In the book the author documents various ways in which social connectedness impacts our well being.
As this article and book say "loneliness kills", but what does that mean for those of us who want to live long and healthy lives? Do we need to start scheduling social time alongside gym time? Will a hug a day keep the doctor away? Should we join organized religions or get married strictly for the health benefits?
>> "Should we join organized religions or get married strictly for the health benefits?"
As a married religious person who was once single and not so religious, I can attest that faith and marriage have generally made me happier.
Given the choice again, I'd utilize both regardless of health benefits. I do wonder if that general happiness factor contributes to better health in indirect ways.
Of course the risk of marriage is that if the marriage falls apart it can cause devastating unhappiness for a long time, that you may never really recover from.
>As this article and book say "loneliness kills", but what does that mean for those of us who want to live long and healthy lives? Do we need to start scheduling social time alongside gym time?
No, we need to stop scheduling things and embrace a less forced, more natural, community-centric, living.
I think your vision of things is the ideal, but it also isn't always practical. If you live a 30 minute drive (or more) away from everyone you know, and service-workers / fellow consumers (people at the grocery store, etc) are anonymous to you, scheduled interaction may be your only interaction.
Of course, that also speaks to a profound failure of urban design and a desolate hellscape. Human-scale communities where you're a 10-30 minute _walk_ from your friends make this sort of less-forced living much easier.
> service-workers / fellow consumers (people at the grocery store, etc) are anonymous to you
But they don't have to be anonymous to you, that's also a rather new and urban development: The expectation that nobody should "bother" anybody else unless they already know them or have some business reason to do so.
In smaller communities, everybody knew most of their "service-workers" even outside of their service function, that wasn't something out of the ordinary it was pretty much normal.
I agree, but for whatever reason I've only gotten to know people in different settings. I am familiar enough with the person in the corner shop, but not so much with the supermarket or department store. I wonder why that is (perhaps because I generally get the same person at the corner shop?)
> Should we join organized religions or get married strictly for the health benefits?
While religion and marriage are the most popular and accessible options for finding community and social support, there are other options like meetup groups, travel communities, polyamorous communities, group yoga classes, etc. Just mentioning that for anyone out there who's thinking they have to join a religion they don't believe in to find community.
Should we join organized religions or get married strictly for the health benefits
Sure, why not? So long as you can use from it what is beneficial and leave the rest. Everyone gets married for some reason (have kids, finances, politics, lust, love etc...). If you do it to be happier and live a longer live, then all the more power. Everyone who choosed their religion did so for some reason (get closer to God, politics, fashion, soul-finding etc...). If you do it to be happier and live a longer live, then all the more power.
No, not strictly for the health benefits. Do them for their own sake, and they can bring you great joy. Do them without attention to their essential meaning, and you will be living falsely. This will not make you happy or healthy.
Note that what they reportedly found is a stronger positive correlation between relationships and happiness than between money and fame and happiness (just based on the article):
"Close relationships, more than money or fame, are what keep people happy throughout their lives, the study revealed"
So going after fame and money doesn't necessarily lead you to become unhappy (if we interpret the results as causal). Quality personal relationships just makes you even happier.
Also, I'm curious to what extent cultivating meaningful relationship serves as a coping mechanism for people with little money or social status (alternatively, focusing on making money and acquiring high social status to compensate for poor personal relationship development skills). My impression, based on my observations from people I've met in developing countries, is that low income / social status people tend to have richer and active communities and personal relationships. High status individuals tend to be lonelier. But this could just be confirmation bias.
The sad thing about this is, nothing of this is news. I did some health research in the 1990s and read tons of studies telling you the same things. One of the best predictors for subjective well-being was whether people had 3+ really close friends.
IMHO there is something wrong with this kind of research that rehashes known facts but doesn't really go any deeper than what was already known before. My gratulations to the researchers involved for getting the funding for such a long running study.
Nothing new under the sun, most things our modern work in social sciences show was figured out by some ancient philosopher or religious leader or another it seems to me.
It was actually kind of new to me when I watched that video two years ago. However, I agree with your point for deeper details. I wondered about the circumstances of those people, the stability of country (war times etc) and many other factors that are not mentioned in the article or the video.
Also, I assume the study is just in America which makes me ask if happiness is the same recipe for different people in different parts of the world.
Was always a fan of his essay "In Praise of Idleness" [1] but never bothered to check if he had more to say on the subject of happiness in general, interesting read, thank you!
I taught social dance for a number of years. This is a great avenue for expanding your social interactions, getting healthy, building self awareness... blah blah blah. There's a great Argentine Tango scene in SF, just sayin, folks.
There's also joining a hiking group or a walking group. Great to get out, get active, and get social.
Or engage with an after school program, or mentorship organization.
Besides health, might financial well-being also lead to healthier/happier relationships? If you're poor and have to work two full-time jobs, the precious free time you do have may not be easily allocated to socializing. And, many social hobbies require capital.
While it does shed a light on the "quest for meaning", this study is not useful as long as we lack the understanding of the role of personality. I think a good analogy is researchers finding that a certain disease kills, but not knowing how do you contract that disease and what you can do to cure it. It might help you identify your situation, but not how to change it.
This reads like someone consciously decided "Hey, let's build the ultimate poster boy for bad statistical studies!".
1. Sample bias: "Why just study WEIRD [1] subjects? Let's do male Harvard graduates!" (Yes, half the study included inner city men, and one eighth of the duration featured women. It's still super heavily biased towards Harvard men.)
2. Correlation is not causation: "Hmm, health is correlated with relationship satisfaction. Could there be a common cause for both? Or maybe people like to hang out with healthier peers? No, the clear conclusion is that working on your relationships magically makes you healthier."
3. Inconsistent data collection: "Those '30s nincompoops were measuring skulls and handwriting. We'll stop doing that and take MRIs instead. But it's still the same study!"
This sort of snarky comment that dispenses with the life work of others by means of internet clichés is the sort of thing for which pg coined the term "middlebrow dismissal". Perhaps you really do know better than specialists who worked in a field for decades, but if so, you're doing your superior knowledge an injustice by presenting it so basely. We're sincerely hoping to do better than that in this community, and would appreciate it if you'd join us in the effort.
The parent comment raises some good points. The sample size here is too small and the article's conclusion has loads of confirmation bias, also displayed in majority of the comments here.
> This sort of snarky comment that dispenses with the life work of others by means of internet clichés [...] specialists who worked in a field for decades
So if the work is so polished then it should be really easy to defend on its merits right? I find it curious that your main argument is instead about the work's authors.
That's not the argument at all. The argument is that the internet genre of the snarky dismissal is harmful in its own right. It subtly (and not-so-subtly) encourages many of the things we don't want here. So please stop posting like that.
If you have a substantive point to make, make it thoughtfully; otherwise please don't comment until you do.
"Psychiatrist George Vaillant, who joined the team as a researcher in 1966, led the study from 1972 until 2004. Trained as a psychoanalyst, Vaillant emphasized the role of relationships, and came to recognize the crucial role they played in people living long and pleasant lives."
My first thought was that he found what he was looking for.
This is an unfair and reflexive assessment. The study has clear and obvious limitations, and does not pretend otherwise.
You are also acting like the results of modern psychology studies are somehow superior or more useful. Where did you get that outlandish notion from exactly? Every such study I read about seems to go through a cycle of hyped up result (eg power posing) to TED talk to book deal to failure to replicate to finally working out these results are either irrelevant, invalid or just fake.
1. is an issue with external validity (i.e. does the findings generalize to other groups). But the comparison being made in the study is within a given group with similar socioeconomic status (all Harvard males). Assuming that they only vary in the quality of their personal relationships, any difference in happiness because of this could, assuming it is causal, be interpreted as a generalizable effect of relationship quality.
I don't see anything wrong with the subjects being predominantly male Harvard graduates.
A healthy and happy life means something different for an African farmer or for an Oxford professor. Obviously this study is concerned about the later. I also imagine that back in the day there were far more male graduates at Harvard.
This is a great article. I agree with the comments here that says working at home can really squish your mood. It makes me wonder about social security. I remember some comments here about if they got rid of it, grandma would have to move in. Well, according to this article, that might be the best thing for grandma! I work from home but have been staying with my in laws since we had a baby. It has been great for my mental health.
Assuming that good relationships imply good aging, I'd like to know how do they work. How much would differ a long relationship from 2 middle relationships to 7 short relationships?
If there's already any study about it, please share it with me, I'd love to read it!
Step 1 - be an adult white male graduated at the beginning of an unprecedented and unique economic boom
Step 2 - graduate out of the most prominent college of the period
Step 3 - watch your asset grow themselves
Step 4 - enjoy the life without never have to worry about job security, housing, spending power
Yeah no shit sherlock. I guess being upper middle class does wonder to one life. Meanwhile we have to contend with constant worry about our future, our kids future and one misstep in our career path can and will landslide into a life of regrets.
And this study just say 'socialize' and everything else will magically go away.
Please don't post snarky internet insta-dismissals to HN. They greatly lower the quality of discussion, even when they have some good points to make. There are several such posts in this thread and that's a problem.
The entire genre of internet comments that dismiss the life-work of others with a contemptuous hand-wave is problematic. Critique is good, but it should seriously engage with what it is criticizing. That takes effort, for which nastiness is an ugly substitute.
Even if that's true, the I-know-better, snark-plus-clichés genre is a problem here regardless of how bad an article is. This sort of comment is common on the internet and poisons the environment it's posted to. By practicing it here, you degrade the community and make it less interesting for all of us. That's the real reason not to do it: for much the same reason you don't litter in parks. We want thoughtful conversation here, not acid. Even about bad articles.
Btw that longitudinal Harvard study has been well-known and interesting for long time, despite its flaws. Previous HN threads have discussed it without sinking into snark and I doubt that the community has become smarter since then.
"During the intervening decades, the control groups have expanded. In the 1970s, 456 Boston inner-city residents were enlisted as part of the Glueck Study, and 40 of them are still alive."
"Those ties protect people from life’s discontents, help to delay mental and physical decline, and are better predictors of long and happy lives than social class, IQ, or even genes. That finding proved true across the board among both the Harvard men and the inner-city participants."
The study control for the effects of class. That refutes some of your assertions.
With baby boomers, sure, the second most privileged generation on earth.
Hint: it's hard to develop a social life working 60 hours a week, vice versa, people that can afford a good living standard are more likely to have the time to socialize.
This study does nothing to verify if their ipothesys is correlation, causation or coincidence (because, let's be honest, 500 ppl and without a control group?)
TLDR: year 0 - 29 - Experience as much trauma, stress, and failure as you possibly can.
30+ - Stop giving a fuck about your unaddressed trauma and find a new reason to strive to stay alive.
It's precisely that many of the participants did not have happy (or healthy) lives that makes the study interesting.
You're right that the initial sample is much narrower than ideal. That's why they've broadened the study to include a comparator group of city men and second-generation participants of both genders.
I'm familiar with the rules and think you've over-focused on the form, and ignored the legitimate content, of my comment.
I like this study! I didn't call it 'bullshit' and there's nothing nasty in my formulation.
But the high-order bit of things to be considered in the limits of this study's interpretation is how peculiar the main focus group - Harvard enrollees in 1938 - was.
This HU house-press piece only obliquely hints at the issue, by noting how the study has gradually expanded to include children and wives, and an "inner-city" "control group".
I realize wrapping the point in a formulaic meme risks making it look like pure snark/dismissal. But it can also be a way to sharply and memorably raise a very specific issue.
I don't mean to be offensive or inflammatory, but how is this a discovery? Yes, money and success don't buy you happiness; living in a complete community is healthy. How was this not completely obvious?
I've been working from home for a number of years. During this time I've on average spoken with and interacted with 1 person every day - my wife.
I occasionally go out, occasionally see family members, but the majority of my day-to-day work is quiet, alone, working at a computer.
- I have been more sick in recent years than ever before in my life. This is even compared to previously living in a major city and taking public transportation.
- I have been experiencing sharp mental decline especially in the last year. Solving complex problems is much more challenging.
- My memory is suffering. Even my wife has begun to notice, I forget little things and have developed an "aloof professor" disposition that wasn't natural to me.
- I now find social interaction more difficult. I'm more akward, and find myself over-thinking previously natural interactions.
- Lastly ... I'm far more depressed. I just don't enjoy much these days. I wake up, work, don't talk to many people.
The TLDR here is that I urge everyone to tend to their social garden. I let mine decay for too long, and I'm paying the price now. I am beginning the process of restoring connections, and getting out more, and I'm already noticing an improved mood.
Oh and I should mention - I'm naturally an introvert so this reclusive lifestyle was all too comfortable for me.