Loneliness kills people with medium and low IQ

Photo: Max Pixel

Many modern people tend to get away from their parents and live separately. But few people appreciate the risks to health that face social exclusion. Every year the number of people living alone, without a partner and family, is growing. Worse, many even work from home, minimizing communication with other people. In recent years, many scientific studies have been conducted that show the real danger of such a lifestyle.

According to American statistics, over the past 30 years, the number of people over 45 who live alone has almost doubled : from 20% to 35% of respondents. For example, in a sample of 45-49 years of single people, 43% did.

It seems to be a reverse trend among young people: more and more young boys and girls continue to live with their parents. This may be due to economic difficulties and rising unemployment among young people. Some modern boys and girls do not see a reason to work every day, if you can hang out and play computer games, staying with your parents and sometimes earning money. Strangely enough, such “dependent” behavior can save both their lives and the lives of their parents, who have a much higher risk of being left alone. On the other hand, such a lifestyle reduces the likelihood of finding a partner, which again increases the risk of being alone in adulthood and old age.
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For single people, the risk of mortality increases about as much as from smoking tobacco - the most deadly of the "legal drugs", which takes hundreds of thousands of lives each year.

Compared with obesity (overweight), loneliness is twice the risk to life. In other words, an obese married man will almost certainly live longer than a normal athletic but single man.

Social isolation immediately worsens health. Like a decline in social status, loneliness immediately impairs the immune system and increases the risk of inflammation. It is a direct route to arthritis, type II diabetes, and cardiovascular disease . The risk of stroke increases by 32% .

For lonely older people, the risk of premature death doubles . Life in solitude worsens sleep , accelerates cognitive degradation .

Apparently, the mechanism of worsening health and increasing mortality among single people is exactly the same as that of people with low social status. The reason is an increase in chronic stress (see the study of the level of stress hormones in single people ). In other words, if you enjoy the pleasure of living alone, then there is no such risk, and there should be no harm to health. The key factor is precisely the level of stress. If stress increases in family life with children, then the wife and children will become a risk factor, not loneliness.

A person is a social being, therefore for most people it is quite natural to live with a partner and actively communicate with relatives. If a person is alone and socially isolated (due to a low position in society or for other reasons), this should naturally lead to increased stress. Studies of monkeys have shown that such "lowered" monkeys are offended by their relatives, more often males are more likely to coerce them, etc.

In modern society, sources of stress are not the same as in monkey groups, but the basic rules of social behavior have changed little. Like monkeys, people still prefer to actively communicate with the "tribe" and improve their position in the group. People left without a partner are engaged in self-determination and say to themselves : "If I were the best person, I would not be alone." Because of this attitude, stress levels increase and health risks occur. Probably, such an attitude towards loneliness is generally accepted. But if you set a goal to get rid of stress and health risks, then you need to train the opposite attitude. Probably tell yourself: "Only successful people can live happily alone" or something like that. Of course, one must sincerely believe in what has been said and be proud of being alone. In the end, scientists have proven that people with high IQ do not need a lot of friends to be happy .

The higher the person’s intelligence, the less influence on the level of happiness is the number of friends and social connections. Moreover, there is even a negative correlation. That is, only an intellectually developed person - the less social intercourse, the better for him. The study showed that smart people really feel worse if they communicate with relatives and friends a lot.

It would seem that the Internet and social networks should reduce the feeling of loneliness, but scientific studies show that this is not so. The situation is rather reversed. A Facebook user survey found that the amount of time spent on the social network is directly correlated with the deterioration of well-being and the feeling of being alone. The more a person spends on social networks - the more lonely he feels, and vice versa. Recent studies show a real positive effect on well-being, if you abandon social networks for a while. Although such experiments have not yet been carried out, it can be assumed that a complete long-term abandonment of social networks may have a more sustainable long-term effect in improving well-being.

The same can happen in a large society of unfamiliar people. In such a large crowd, a person will still feel socially isolated, just like in a social network. Even in densely populated cities, people feel worse than in less populated ones. That is, the number of friends and acquaintances is not as important as the "quality" of communication.

Taking into account all the studies that have been carried out, one can conclude that loneliness really kills people (as they say on smoking-kills packs). But unlike smoking, here the effect is selective in intelligence. That is, social isolation is more harmful for people with normal and low IQ. Experts advise such people to specifically train communication, including with their neighbors.

For their social communication should be monitored as for blood pressure. Check daily, lead a healthy lifestyle and do exercises.