Sсiеntifiс Аmеricаn Mind – September – October 2019 (Tablet Edition)

(Wang) #1
BEHAVIOR & SOCIETY

A Solution


for Loneliness
Get out and volunteer, research suggests

I


was riding a bus recently and noticed an older
man sitting outside a coffee shop on a busy
sidewalk. He had set up a chessboard on the
table in front of him, and he watched as people
passed by, mostly engrossed in their phones. His
eyes kept jumping from person to person, search-
ing for someone to notice and join him for a game
of chess. Right before the traffic cleared and my
bus moved on, he reached over to make the first
move and then resumed his searching.
Loneliness is rampant, and it’s killing us—liter-
ally. Anywhere from one quarter to one half of
Americans feel lonely a lot of the time, which puts
them at risk for developing a range of physical
and mental illnesses, including heart disease,
cancer, diabetes and depression. This is a public
health problem that needs to be addressed on a
wide scale.
But at the individual level, there is much we
can do to ward off loneliness. One strategy is to
bring a chessboard to a busy street and wait for

someone to play with you. For the older man’s
sake, I sincerely hope that this is effective, but I
can’t be sure.
Another strategy is to volunteer. In a recent
survey of more than 10,000 people in the U.K.,
two thirds reported that volunteering helped them

feel less isolated. Similarly, a 2018 study of nearly
6,000 people across the U.S. examined widows
who, unsurprisingly, felt lonelier than married
adults. After starting to volunteer for two or more
hours per week, their average level of loneliness
subsided to match that of married adults, even

Kasley Killam drives community engagement in
health research for Project Baseline at Verily and is a
World Economic Forum global shaper. Her background
is in psychology research and health care innovation.

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OPINION

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