In a world that is seemingly more connected than ever, loneliness is rampant. This is concerning because loneliness negatively affects mental and physical health. For example, loneliness is linked to increased risk for depression, suicide, cardiovascular disease, and mortality.
If you have ever felt lonely, you've probably been told that socializing with others is the best antidote to curing your loneliness. Today's digital and technologically advanced world provides us with endless ways to socialize. It can be as easy as the touch of a button to connect with others. Yet, despite the ways that technology has made it easy to interact with others, rates of loneliness continue to rise. This prompts a crucial question: is there more to fighting loneliness than simply interacting with others?
How We Interact Matters
In our recent research, we sought to better understand the key ingredients of social interactions that increase or decrease loneliness in day-to-day social interactions. We examined two key features of social interactions that affect how people feel: (1) the type of interaction (sometimes called the platform) and (2) interaction quality.
Type of Interaction: Social interactions can occur in a myriad of ways––in person, over the phone (phone call, texting), or online through social media (Facebook, Instagram), dating apps, or video calls, to name a few. Some of these types of interactions may be better than others for reducing loneliness. For example, people typically find in-person interactions to be more meaningful and beneficial than interactions that happen over the phone or online, which might mean that people have the best chance of reducing their loneliness when they socialize face-to-face.
Quality of Interaction: The quality of interactions also impacts how good or bad people feel. People evaluate the quality of their interactions in many ways. In high-quality interactions, people feel they can be themselves, don't feel judged during the interaction, and find others friendly. Research shows that social interactions with these positive qualities lead to better mental health outcomes, including decreased loneliness, whereas social interactions that lack these qualities can worsen loneliness and isolation.
To test if these features really impact loneliness, we asked 269 participants to report which types of interactions they had each day for 14 days (in-person or via messaging, social media, video call, or some other way) and to rate the quality of their interactions based on multiple aspects: the enjoyment and meaning of the social interaction, how socially connected, authentic, closed off, and rejected they felt, how warm and friendly or critical and judgmental they thought the other person(s) was, and how interested they thought the other person(s) was in them and the conversation.
We found that people felt the least lonely when they socialized in person compared to other platforms. This might be because interacting face-to-face provides more opportunities for physical closeness and access to important nonverbal cues. We also found that people felt less lonely when they had enjoyable interactions and when they felt close and connected to the people they interacted with.
Conversely, people felt the loneliest when they felt distant and closed off from the people they socialized with. These social interactions tainted with disconnection actually prolonged feelings of loneliness. This implies that steering clear of negative interactions may be more important to alleviating loneliness than seeking out positive interactions.
Despite our hyper-connected world, loneliness remains a pressing issue. Although it's commonly thought that socializing is the remedy, our research reveals that not all social interactions are created equal. Socializing can be the key to curing your loneliness if you have a fair dose of face-to-face interactions and interactions that are filled with warmth and authenticity. On the flip side, minimizing interactions that lack intimacy and are filled with judgement can reduce loneliness.
For Further Reading
Silva, G., Rum, R., Brennan, J., Rottenberg, J., & Goodman, F. R. (2023). What allays loneliness? A fine-grained examination of daily social interactions. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 02654075231181709. https://doi.org/10.1177/02654075231181709
Sun, J., Harris, K., & Vazire, S. (2020). Is well-being associated with the quantity and quality of social interactions? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 119(6), 1478–1496. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000272
Gabriella Silva is a Clinical Psychology Graduate Student at the University of South Florida and studies social anxiety, rejection, social connection, and loneliness.
Ruba Rum is a Clinical Psychology Graduate Student at the University of South Florida and studies social anxiety, depression, and mental health stigma.
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