Feeling lonely can also have a negative impact on your mental health, especially if these feelings have lasted a long time. Some research suggests that loneliness is associated with an increased risk of certain mental health problems, including depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, sleep problems and increased stress.
Long term feelings of loneliness and social isolation can also reduce cognitive skills, such as the ability to concentrate, make decisions, problem-solve, and even change negative self-beliefs. And it can ultimately lead to depression.
Previous research suggests an association of loneliness and social isolation (LNL-ISO) with schizophrenia.
Effects of Social Isolation and Loneliness
Mental and physical health are interconnected. Social isolation's adverse health consequences range from sleeplessness to reduced immune function. Loneliness is associated with higher anxiety, depression, and suicide rates.
"Loneliness can change the neurochemistry of the brain, turning off the dopamine neurons, which trigger the reward response, and causing some degeneration in the brain when the reward response is not activated," says Katherine Peters, MD, PhD, FAAN, associate professor of neurology and neurosurgery at Duke University.
Psychologists generally consider loneliness to be a stable trait, meaning that individuals have different set-points for feeling loneliness, and they fluctuate around these set-points depending on the circumstances in their lives.
Hawkley points to evidence linking perceived social isolation with adverse health consequences including depression, poor sleep quality, impaired executive function, accelerated cognitive decline, poor cardiovascular function and impaired immunity at every stage of life.
As humans, we are engineered for many challenges. One of the challenges that we are not well equipped for, however, is loneliness. The Covid-19 period of on and off lockdowns, restrictions, and social isolation have made it abundantly clear that we are not meant to be alone.
Similarly, some patients isolated in intensive care units also develop a psychotic syndrome including visual hallucinations and paranoid delusion, unrelated to their neurological condition (Granberg-Axèll et al., 2001).
Recent findings: Longitudinal studies identified that people who feel lonely are more likely to become depressed or to experience relapse of mood disorders. There is emerging evidence that feelings of loneliness or mandatory social isolation can precede manic episodes.
Research has linked social isolation and loneliness to higher risks for a variety of physical and mental conditions: high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity, a weakened immune system, anxiety, depression, cognitive decline, Alzheimer's disease, and even death.
Isolation. Paranoid thoughts can make you feel alone. You might feel as if no one understands you, and it can be hard when other people don't believe what feels very real to you. If you avoid people or stay indoors a lot, you may feel even more isolated.
On the general scale, women have reported having higher levels of loneliness than men. Except for one category: single men are the lonelier group compared to single women. Women are more socially minded and are therefore able to better maintain close relationships than men.
These feelings of loneliness may ultimately lead to posttraumatic stress symptoms via a number of pathways. For example, loneliness may lead to the development of negative cognitions (Cacioppo and Hawkley, 2009), which can predict future PTSD symptoms and impact PTSD treatment (Brown et al., 2019).
Social isolation can lead to feelings of loneliness, fear of others, or negative self-esteem. Lack of consistent human contact can also cause conflict with the (peripheral) friends. The socially isolated person may occasionally talk to or cause problems with family members.
Being alone doesn't lead to health problems. But when people feel disconnected and cut off from the world, it's a different story. Although living alone may put some individuals at greater risk of experiencing those feelings, research shows that people who live with others can also feel isolated.
No population can live alone in nature. It is dependent on other populations for various requirements. Animals get food, shelter and oxygen from plants. Plants depend upon animals for carbon dioxide.
Not having social relationships, especially in the long term, seems to have an effect on self-esteem, job or work performance, and overall communication skills. Further, scientific evidence has found health disorders in people who have little to no social relationships.
A cure for loneliness may be closer than you think as Cacioppo found that pregnenolone (a steroid naturally made in the body) can help combat the anxiety that comes with feelings of loneliness.
Causes of loneliness include life changes that lead to social isolation, like moving to a new place, grieving a death, or the end of a relationship. In some cases, loneliness is linked with mental health conditions like depression.
“When you're experiencing loneliness, your levels of cortisol, a stress hormone, go up,” she says. “Cortisol can impair cognitive performance, compromise the immune system, and increase your risk for vascular problems, inflammation and heart disease.”