One is the loneliest number, but so is two, three, etc.

By William Atkins
Tuesday, 01 December 2009 18:13

Science - Health

According to a U.S. study performed over ten years and written up in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, loneliness can be spread from person to person—it's contagious!


Over five thousand people were studied during a ten-year period by John T. Cacioppo (Department of Psychology, University of Chicago), Nicholas A. Christakis (Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School), and James Fowler (Department of Political Science, University of California-San Diego).

The study was performed in Framingham, Massachusetts, with the average age of the participant being 64 years.

The people completed questionnaires about feelings they felt during the previous week, all over a ten-year period

They found that a lonely feeling person increases the chance that someone they know will also begin to feel lonely, isolated, or even desolate.

Dr. Cacioppo states, “Loneliness can be transmitted. Loneliness is not just the property of an individual. It can be transmitted across people -- even people you don't have direct contact with." [The Washington Post: “Feeling lonely? Chances are you're not alone”]

Dr. Christakis adds, "No man is an island. Something so personal as a person's emotions can have a collective existence and affect the vast fabric of humanity." [The Washington Post]

The U.S. researchers also concluded that women are more likely to catch loneliness from someone that are men.

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