What loneliness does to our body. What does female loneliness lead to...

Steve Cole

Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is involved in genome research and computational bioinformatics. One of the founders of social genomics.

Being alone and feeling lonely are not the same thing at all. Loneliness is the feeling that we have fewer meaningful social connections than we would like. Of course, everything is individual. For someone to live comfortably, it is enough to have one loved one, others don’t even have ten. However, scientists note that in Lately All more people feel lonely Perceived social isolation, evolutionary fitness and health outcomes: a lifespan approach..

Study Finds Loneliness Linked to High Blood Pressure Loneliness is a unique predictor of age-related differences in systolic blood pressure. and heart problems Women, Loneliness, and Incident Coronary Heart Disease..

It turns out that loneliness breaks our hearts in a completely literal sense of the word.

In addition, a 2015 meta-analysis of 70 studies found that loneliness increases the risk of probable death by 26% Loneliness and Social Isolation as Risk Factors for Mortality.. And, for example, depression and anxiety disorder increase the risk of death by only 21%. Association between psychological distress and mortality.

Loneliness is much greater than heartache. This is a biological wound that causes the destruction of body cells.
Steve Cole

How loneliness affects the cellular level

In 2007, Cole, along with other scientists from the University of California, made an interesting discovery. It turned out that the cells of those who suffer from chronic loneliness look different. Scientists have noticed two main genetic differences between lonely and non-lonely people.

In lonely people, genes responsible for the body's inflammatory response are much more active. And this is quite dangerous. Yes, inflammation is necessary for the body to cope with injury. But if inflammatory processes occur constantly, this creates an excellent environment for the development of atherosclerosis, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases, as well as metastatic disease. "This is one explanation for why lonely people are more susceptible to these diseases," Cole says.
At the same time, the activity of a group of genes responsible for fighting viral infections is suppressed. These genes are responsible for the production of special proteins - type 1 interferons, which prevent the proliferation of viruses in the body.

Gain inflammatory reaction during times of stress it is quite logical. But why doesn’t the body want to fight viruses?

According to Cole, this is a biological trade-off. The body usually fights bacteria through inflammation. But a typical reaction to viruses creates a favorable environment for bacteria to multiply. Therefore, the body makes a choice which of the two reactions to activate.

Overall, Cole believes that the response to chronic loneliness is not much different from the response to other sources of chronic stress - low socioeconomic status or post-traumatic stress disorder.

Cole's findings, confirmed by other researchers Loneliness, eudaimonia, and the human conserved transcriptional response to adversity., indicate that lonely people are more prone to chronic diseases and cope worse with illnesses. This partly explains the increased mortality among single people.

Of course, this is not the only reason. Naturally, life is easier when there is someone who can take you to the doctor or support you in a difficult situation.

Loneliness is vicious circle. The more isolated we feel, the more threatened we feel. And the more we feel that something is threatening us, the more we strive for isolation.

How to prevent the consequences of loneliness

According to the results of some studies, cellular symptoms weaken when the feeling of loneliness passes Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction training reduces loneliness and pro-inflammatory gene expression in older adults.. However, Cole says there is not yet enough evidence that trying to make people less lonely actually helps.

Attempts to give people back the meaning of life are more effective. For example, one charity in Los Angeles brings together lonely elderly people and students primary school. Elderly people help schoolchildren with homework and look after them, which gives them purpose and helps them feel healthier.

Of course, the body needs stress from time to time. And loneliness happens to us. Periods of loneliness throughout life are completely natural.

But according to Cole, loneliness is now becoming an epidemic that needs to be fought. After all, it is even more dangerous for health than anxiety and depression, which we usually fear.

Feelings of abandonment, uselessness and loneliness are very common among people. Women are most susceptible to the manifestation of this range of feelings, but men are no exception either. These are deep emotional experiences that greatly influence a person’s life.

Nature of occurrence

Experiencing constant pressure from these negative emotions, there is a desire to go as far as possible, to completely isolate yourself from the whole world, people and everything that happens around. In the early stages of these sensations, people try to turn to their loved ones and friends for help, but often receive an incomprehensible answer. Or even worse, without trying to understand the essence of the problem, to get to its roots, suggestions are made in the form of advice that everything free time need to be devoted to work, hobbies or some other interests. That is, to “score” your life as much as possible different ways so that there is no time left for the blues, creating additional difficulties and problems for yourself. But such advice does not bring anything good, and certainly will not help you get out of this obsessive state of uselessness and complete loneliness.

This problem can only be solved by getting to the origins of these psychological problems. Often these reasons lie in early childhood, when the child experienced severe stress under the influence of the surrounding world. The reason for this could be:

Quarrels with classmates, peers and other children;
Problems in the family, lack of understanding between the child and parents;
Conflict situations with other people;
Failure to accept the child’s point of view and opinions by elders;
Unsolved problems adolescence.

Sad consequences

IN certain moment, the peak of this emotional pressure The human psyche, using protective mechanisms, decided to abstract, seclude and isolate itself within itself. Such defensive reaction occurs as a result of hypertrophy of the main instinct of all living organisms - the instinct of self-preservation.

Subsequently, to the levels of the unconscious under the influence of any external factors, a person activates this mechanism anew, forming an impenetrable dome around his life and himself, avoiding any interaction with the outside world, not letting anything through this dome. All these states of abandonment, melancholy and loneliness arise for the reason that the external threat, from which the psyche so uniquely protected the psyche in difficult moments, has gone away, but this impenetrable thick dome of isolation remains.

When others try to make contact with such a person, nothing good comes of it. This is due to the fact that it psychological protection lines up like this, trying to avoid some danger, immediately abstracts itself, breaks off all contact. Over a long period of time, these processes spoil a person’s life; gradually loneliness fills all areas of his life, cutting off the path to returning to normal life.

Also watch the webinar “Melancholy, loneliness, abandonment” by Denis Burkhaev.

How to get rid of the feeling of uselessness and loneliness?

You can solve the problem of a constant feeling of uselessness, abandonment and loneliness only by breaking this imaginary dome, convincing yourself of the need to change something in your life, using various techniques and practice. The main thing on the way to solving this issue is to understand the mechanisms of occurrence of these psychological problems and a sincere desire to get rid of them, to free yourself and your life for new events, acquaintances and new joys.

An ordinary girl, Sarah Shourd, spent about two months in the Evin prison in Tehran: she heard extraneous steps, saw lights, spent most of her time on all fours and listened to what was happening behind her. closed door. That summer, 32-year-old Sarah, accompanied by two of her friends, went traveling through the mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan. On the border with Iran they were arrested on suspicion of espionage and taken into custody. Sarah spent about ten thousand hours in solitary confinement, haunted by hallucinations. “With my peripheral vision I recorded flashes of light, but when I turned my head, they immediately disappeared,” the girl said in an interview The New York Times in 2011. - One day I heard someone screaming. This scream remained in my ears until a friendly guard brought me to my senses. It turned out that I was the one screaming.”

We all want to be alone from time to time, away from the crowd and conversations with colleagues. But loneliness within a group of people and being alone with yourself are two different things. For the vast majority of people, prolonged social isolation has a detrimental effect on psychological health. We are familiar with this phenomenon not only from the stories of others, but also from scientific studies and experiments on isolation and social deprivation, many of which were never completed due to the frightening reactions of the subjects. Why do people capable of losing their minds when left alone with themselves, and is there a way to avoid insanity in such situations?

Few would argue that isolation is physically harmful to humans. It is known that lonely people are more likely to suffer from high pressure, they are more vulnerable to viral infections In addition, they have an increased risk of developing Alzheimer's syndrome and dementia. Loneliness affects well-being: sleep state, attention, logical and verbal thinking, and causes frustration immune system, hormonal imbalance, activates inflammatory processes in the body. What's behind similar violations, it is not entirely clear - perhaps the reason lies in evolution - for our ancestors, being without the support of their fellow tribesmen was physically dangerous.

In the modern world, refusal of contacts with other people entails not only various kinds of illnesses, but the greatest blow falls on the work of consciousness. For example, isolation affects our perception of time. People who spent for a long time without sunlight, noted the effect of a time shift. Mikel Siffre went on a two-week expedition to study underground glaciers French Alps. After some time, he discovered that under the influence of darkness his consciousness began to change, and he decided to spend another two months underground. The researcher left all the measuring instruments outside and lived in accordance with his biological clock. After completing the experiment, Mikel discovered that two minutes of earthly time were equivalent to 5 of his subjective minutes underground.

A similar effect of time dilation was observed by sociologist and amateur speleologist Maurizio Montalbini. In 1993, he spent 366 days in an underground cave built by NASA to train astronauts. Maurizio himself was convinced that only 219 days had passed during his absence; daily cycle almost doubled. Recent studies have also shown that in the dark, most people adjust to a 48-hour rhythm - 36 hours of wakefulness and 12 hours of sleep. Causes this phenomenon still not installed.

In the mid-twentieth century, many experiments were carried out on human social deprivation. In the 1950s and 60s, it was believed that the Chinese were using solitary confinement to "indoctrinate" American prisoners of war captured during the Korean War. Around the same time, the US and Canadian departments of defense began to fund a series of experiments that seemed unacceptable from the point of view of modern Western ethics. For example, a study by psychologist Donald Hebb, which took place in medical center McGill University in Montreal. The scientists invited volunteers—mostly college students—to live for two to several weeks in soundproof rooms. The goal was to keep the subjects' physical activity to a minimum and see how they responded. The subjects were given special equipment that reduced the ability to perceive information to a minimum: glasses, gloves, cardboard cuffs reaching to the fingertips, U-shaped sound-absorbing pillows that were placed on the head. Air conditioners were installed inside the rooms, the noise of which drowned out any external sounds. After just a couple of hours, the volunteers felt anxious; they wanted to regain their ability to feel and tried to break the monotony of their pastime: they tried talking, singing or reading poetry out loud.

Later, many of them began to behave extremely emotionally and restlessly, and the isolation also affected their intellectual abilities, ability to solve arithmetic problems and pass association tests. The most disturbing effects were hallucinations—lights turning into lines, spots, and even specific visual images such as squirrels carrying backpacks over their shoulders or a procession of glasses walking down the street. The subjects did not control their visions: some imagined dogs, others imagined babies. Some had auditory hallucinations: they heard the sounds of a barrel organ or choir singing. Others have imaginary tactile sensations, as if they were shot in the arm or given an electric shock. IN real world It was not easy for the subjects to shake off this altered perception of reality. It seemed to them that the rooms where they were sitting were in motion, and the objects of the surrounding world were constantly changing their shape and size.

Disturbing end

The experiment had to be interrupted earlier than planned due to the inability of the students to physically continue the tests - no one could hold out in such conditions longer than a week. Hebb subsequently wrote in the American Psychologist that the results alarmed him: “It is one thing to read about how the Chinese brainwashed prisoners of war, it is quite another to watch with your own eyes how people, deprived of the opportunity to observe, listen and touch, go crazy.”

In 2008 clinical psychologist Ian Robbins, in collaboration with the BBC, repeated Hebb's experiment. He put six volunteers in soundproof cells in a former nuclear bunker for 48 hours. The results were similar - development of anxiety, increased emotionality, intrusive thoughts, mental disorders, hallucinations. Why does the brain of a person deprived of tactile sensations behave this way? Cognitive psychologists believe that the part of the brain responsible for performing current tasks becomes accustomed to receiving and processing a large number of information reaching the senses. Robbins notes that when the sources of information disappear, the nervous system still continues to transmit signals to the central processing unit of the brain, despite the falsehood of these signals. The brain, in turn, tries to interpret them, creating holistic images on this basis. In other words, he tries to construct a world on the basis of impulses that weakly reach him, as a result of which he gives birth to a fantastic reality.

Such mental deceptions should not surprise us. First, we know that other primates are also poorly adapted to social isolation. Harry Harlow, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, decided to study this issue in the 1960s using rhesus monkeys as an example. Newborn macaques grew up completely alone from several months to a year. They showed anxiety after 30 days; after a year, their ability to make social contacts at any level was practically destroyed. Secondly, because a person learns to be aware of his emotions through communication with other people. Biologists believe that it was the cooperation of our ancestors in the distant past that contributed to the evolution of human sensory experience. The primary function of emotions is social. If there is no one who can share with us the feelings of fear, anger, anxiety or sadness, and evaluate their appropriateness, then a person will live with a distorted image of himself, an irrational perception of surrounding events and phenomena.

Currently, there are about 25 thousand prisoners in special security prisons in the United States. Without social interaction, such prisoners have no way to test the reality of their emotions and the adequacy of their thoughts, says Terry Kupers, a forensic psychiatrist at the University of California, Berkeley. This is one of the reasons why many people suffer from anxiety, paranoia and obsession. Craig Haney, a psychologist at the University of California at Santa Cruz and a leading expert on the mental health of US prisoners, argues that some of them deliberately begin open confrontation with guards in order to confirm their existence, to remember who they are.

Counter Strategies

Social isolation can wreak havoc on a person's mind, but there are ways to combat it. Everyone copes in their own way - some better, some worse. Is there a way to protect yourself if you happen to be imprisoned? Scientists do not have a consensus on this issue, but let's look at examples of those people who managed to avoid insanity after many years spent alone with themselves.

Hussein Al-Shahristani was Saddam Hussein's chief adviser on nuclear issues. He was imprisoned in Abu Hraim prison near Baghdad after he refused to support a project to develop atomic weapons for Iraq. Hussein managed to maintain his sanity during 10 years of solitary confinement, he trained his brain by solving mathematical problems that he composed for himself. Today he works as Iraq's deputy energy minister. Similar method used during her seven-year captivity by the Hungarian communist government by Edith Bohn, Dr. medical sciences and translator. She constructed an abacus from pieces of stale bread and ran through it in her mind lexicon of six languages that she spoke perfectly.

Members of military organizations endure isolation relatively easier. Caron Fletcher, a consultant psychiatrist who works with former prisoners of war, said the detentions and interrogations he endured during his time in the RAF prepared him well for accepting his own conclusions. “You learn the basics of resistance,” he says. “Besides, you believe that your friends and colleagues will bend over backwards to free you.” In my opinion, military people are less likely to succumb to despair in a difficult situation. Feelings of hopelessness and helplessness can play a toll on you. cruel joke, they undermine morale and the will to live."

American Senator John McCain proved by his example that a military mindset provides psychological advantages in this matter. The five and a half years he spent in prison in Vietnam only strengthened his spirit. He talks about the two years of his imprisonment as follows: “Solitary confinement is a terrible thing. They crush your spirit and weaken your ability to resist more than any other form of cruelty... Despair overwhelms you immediately. It's yours main enemy for the period of imprisonment."

Extreme reality

Psychologists studying how people cope with the effects of isolation have learned a lot from the experiences of pioneers and mountaineers. For many adventurers who have voluntarily withdrawn from society, being in contact with nature can serve as an effective substitute for personal interaction. Norwegian psychologist Gro Sandahl from the University of Bergen surveyed a group of travelers on how they cope in extreme conditions alone, and noted that the ability to accept the situation is the main method of solving this problem: “Then they feel safe, they feel less lonely.” A similar psychological phenomenon explains why shipwrecked and sailors marooned on a desert island, imaginary friends appear, and sometimes groups of imaginary comrades-in-arms with whom they try to share loneliness. This kind of madness is simply defense mechanism. Like the story of explorer Ellen MacArthur and her trimaran called Moby. During her circumnavigation of the world in 2005, the girl sent letters to friends with the signature “Love, E. and Moby.” In her public posts on the Internet, she used the pronoun “we” instead of “I.”

It would be hard to find a clearer illustration of the power of loneliness to crush one person and liberate another than the story of Bernard Moitessier and Donald Crowhurst, two competitors in the 1968 Sunday Times Golden Globe Round the World Regatta. Moitessier, an ascetic Frenchman, practiced yoga throughout his journey and fed the petrels that sat on his stern - he enjoyed the process so much that the idea of returning to civilization became alien to him. Having sailed around the earth one more time, he landed on the island of Tahiti: “I spend all my time on the high seas because here I am happy,” he said. “Perhaps this will help save my soul.” The second participant, Crowhurst, was miserable from the start. He left England with insufficient preparation for the event and sent false reports about his whereabouts from the very beginning of his journey. He drifted aimlessly for months off the coast South America, and his despondency and loneliness only intensified. In the end, he locked himself in his cabin, wrote suicide note and jumped overboard. His body was never found.

What can we conclude from these stories of confrontation and despair? Obviously, we lose a lot of strength when we find ourselves outside of society. Isolation, according to writer Thomas Carlyle, is at the root of unhappiness. However, there are more optimistic assessments that are no less fair - we can always remain sane, even when alone, if we can find solace outside the boundaries of our own “I”. You must always be prepared and be able to show perseverance. At the same time, we cannot underestimate the power of our imagination, which knocks on the walls of solitary confinement, penetrates into ice caves and introduces us to imaginary friends.

Psychologists believe that loneliness contributes to the development of many negative consequences for a person. European countries have been sounding the alarm about this for a long time.

In the UK, around 9 million people are experiencing shortages. social connection with people or fear of possible psychological isolation. There are approximately 200 thousand people in the country old age who have not communicated with relatives, neighbors and acquaintances for months.

But England is not alone in this problem: in Japan, due to growing social isolation, large numbers of people are dying at home, completely alone. There is even special term for a person whose death remained unnoticed by others for a long time - kokodushi.

What is loneliness

In psychiatry, loneliness is considered common symptom everyone mental disorders. Due to problems with adaptation, patients have difficulties communicating and interacting with other people. That is why they become lonely.

Wikipedia has the following information about loneliness - it is a person’s emotional state and a socio-psychological phenomenon. Not everyone is lonely negative character. Thus, a distinction is made between solitude (when you need calm to come to your senses) and isolation (most often forced).

The role of loneliness is to control the level of interpersonal contacts. People with weak nervous system who find it difficult to communicate with unfamiliar people.

Loneliness is a familiar phenomenon to everyone

What does loneliness lead to?

Forced loneliness is dangerous to health to some extent even more than obesity or smoking. A closed lifestyle leads to long-term depression and negatively affects mental health, promotes the development of:

cardiovascular diseases;
pathologies of the musculoskeletal system;
decreased immunity.

The consequences of such loneliness is depression. It’s not for nothing that especially serious criminals are put in solitary confinement in prisons: lack of communication forces a person to immerse himself in himself, live with his own thoughts, and become obsessed.

This leads to hallucinations, mental suffering, apathy and passivity. This condition also leads to a loss of the ability to communicate and be among people.

Positive loneliness or solitude, on the contrary, leads to personality development. Creative people, poets - they all experienced solitude as a way to recuperate. Important role the perception of loneliness by the individual himself is played. If she has a healthy psyche, then this time is used to work on herself, plan, and self-improvement.

If loneliness is not free, but forced (that is, a person suffers from a lack of communication), then this condition needs to be gotten rid of. But before that, you need to find out the reason. Popular reasons for loneliness include:

Stereotypes. Today it is fashionable to be independent, self-sufficient, and not need anyone.
Inflated self-esteem, rudeness. Cynics who ridicule shortcomings to their face, and loneliness for them is a defensive reaction.
Lack of time. “Planes first, girls later” - the words of a famous song brought to life. However, if you do not find a couple before the age of 35, then the bachelor habit will not allow you to enjoy the benefits of marriage.
Dependence on the imaginary or game world. There are forums for communication and social media, for entertainment - online games. This is how separation from people occurs.
Upbringing. Without accepting their daughter’s suitors, their son’s chosen ones, or the child’s friends, the parents themselves impose a regime of “loneliness” on their children.
Passivity. If a person himself does not want to be friends, seek communication, or show interest in others, then no one will impose himself.
Closedness and vulnerability. Unpleasant words remain the same for any person, but if he pays attention to the phrases of others and takes them to heart, then he gradually tries to isolate himself from the pain.

List of common causes of loneliness

How to get rid of loneliness

Forced loneliness is very dangerous, which in the future can threaten the life and health of people, for example, in the elderly or in patients with a certain mental disorder. In these cases, you will not be able to cope with the problem on your own.

But city residents who experience loneliness or anxiety can get rid of the problem on their own. First you need to analyze the situation and assess the possible consequences. A conscious problem is the first step towards change and motivation.

Getting rid of the reasons listed above is quite simple. Additional recommendations require severe conditions. For example, when a similar phenomenon is encountered in two cases:

Insufficient social circle, the environment does not satisfy the needs.
With constant active communication, any solitude causes a feeling of internal discomfort.

In the first case, when there are no acquaintances or relatives who can support you in difficult times, you cannot make new friends, the most important thing is:

overcome the fear of contacting new people;
do not close yourself off;
learn to listen to others;
think positively;
do not judge others;
make concessions, seek compromise solutions.

In the second case negative reaction on psychological condition The Internet provides: social networks and computer communication create and develop the illusion of belonging to a large community of people who follow each other’s lives. This makes the individual dependent on the opinions of others. When there is a fear of solitude, negative emotions, or a feeling of dependence on the outside world, you need to start working on your own dissatisfaction, develop fantasy and imagination. This will help:

reading;
observing nature;
developing the ability to analyze events;
creativity, hobby.

The listed activities will help you switch from external problems to inner world, gain satisfaction from solitude, become an emotionally independent person. Temporary loneliness is not only useful, but also necessary for the development of a self-sufficient personality.

Specialist help

If you decide internal problems You still can’t do it on your own, you can always seek help from a psychologist at the State state-financed organization"Moscow service psychological assistance to the population" (GBU MSPPN). They will help you cope with psychological problems for free.

There are also special psychotherapeutic centers. Most of them are paid, but it is possible to ask a psychologist a question online and anonymously.