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Lonely individuals tend to think and talk in an unusual way, study finds
- cluckindan 2y agoThis is a bullshit study. It is entirely based on trying to confirm a priori assumptions about ”lonely” people, who are seen by authors as pathologically abnormal.
- mocha_nate 2y ago> Chronic loneliness is linked to mental health issues like depression and anxiety, as well as physical health problems, including weakened immunity, cardiovascular disease, and an increased risk of mortality. Lonely individuals tend to experience lower self-esteem, heightened sensitivity to social rejection, and difficulty forming or maintaining relationships. They may also perceive social interactions more negatively, creating a cycle that reinforces their isolation. In older adults, loneliness is particularly concerning, as it is strongly associated with cognitive decline and dementia. In children and adolescents, it can hinder social development and academic performance. I think they are trying to learn more about it to see if there is something that can be done in cases where there are negative outcomes. Not where someone is alone and happy.
- rolph 2y agoself report should be crossed with frequency of interpersonal contacts
- krackers 2y agoSo having individualized, original thoughts not arising from the herd-mind is considered "unusual." What a world we live in.
- lincon127 2y agoWhat a weird thing to take offense to. Also yes, if there's a consensus on something, thinking different to said consensus would be unusual because it's not the usual. There are no value judgements in this article, so really interpreting this in any other way other than the literal sense makes you come off as defensive. More to the article itself, I wonder which comes first, the unusual thoughts, or the loneliness?
- WhyNotHugo 2y agoIt's still a sad world we live in if independent though is unusual.
- scooke 2y agoI lived overseas for a time in an area that didn't use English. I loved it, enjoyed being there, but one day I noticed that I was talking to myself! At first, it was just exclamations out loud (quietly) when something happened around me. It progressed to me describing or evaluating my meal, a book, a scene I was looking at. I realized it when I noticed ppl looking at me strangely (they normally did anyway), and as I looked back wondering why they were looking at me, it hit! I had been talking out loud to myself, normal volume! Why? I figure it was loneliness; but loneliness for hearing English. I was the only one who could speak it! And then it hit me again, a new found epiphany about all those "crazy homeless" ppl who I'd seen back home, muttering to themselves as they wander around. What if, instead of (or in addition to) being mentally unwell, they were just lonely, and having no one to talk to led to them talking to themselves? Whoa.
- tomcam 2y agoThat is surreal! Like one step away from “The Sixth Sense” movie
- ErigmolCt 2y agoLanguage is so tied to our sense of connection and belonging
- WhyNotHugo 2y agoThe few interactions that I've had with homeless people gave me an impression that the thing they needed the most was human interaction. They'd be thankful if they received a meal, but they'd start talking in a way that made me think that what they needed the most was for someone to listen to them or some human interaction. It didn't seem like many people would ever stick around for more than a few seconds. I'm talking about a very small sample size here, but still.
- rajnathani 2y agoFor the homeless, the ratio of meaningful human interactions to total human interactions would be an astoundingly low number.
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- aaron695 2y ago[dead]
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- ErigmolCt 2y agoMakes me think about how deeply loneliness can influence our perception of the world
- distalx 2y agoSo does this mean that if you dial down your contrarian thinking, you might feel less lonely?
- WhyNotHugo 2y agoIntuitively, this makes perfect sense. Non-lonely people interact with one another, continuously exposing themselves to each others views and opinions (even if indirectly). A lonely person won't be part of this echo chamber, so their opinions will usually be self-formed and less influenced by the collective opinion of others. It's easy to see how this creates a feedback loop. A lonely person doesn't share as many worldviews with non-lonely people, so has a harder time fitting in, which makes breaking the cycle even harder.
- prismatix 2y agoIs it just me, or does it feel like a significant proportion of psychological research nowadays comes to "no-brainer' conclusions? I find myself more often looking at an article and thinking, "Well, duh." This is a genuine question. It may just be an environmental shift. Since I used to be deep in the field, I had access to any scientific journal I could think of and the latest research studies. Now I'm mainly seeing pop culture psychology. Has it always been this way?
- bluenomatterwho 2y agoI've heard many unique, difficult or important profiles or roles as being described as 'lonely' in a 'lonely at the top' kind of way (but not limited to primacy). This would include artists, entrepreneurs and leaders, Q-School graduates...
- xg15 2y agoThe causal relationship here would be extremely interesting: Do those individuals start off with brain that is slightly differently wired than the "normie" population and become lonely because they just don't vibe well with them? Or is their loneliness causing their speech and thought patterns to diverge, because they have less opportunities to "resync" with the mainstream culture? Or a sort of feedback loop of both - or something else completely?
- loa_in_ 2y agoI can say from direct anecdotal experience that being excluded leads to being even more excluded in the future unless an outside force intervenes. Social skills, speech, belief in the ability to be understood by others are things that need honing and proofing by experience. The less you have of them, the less meaningful opportunities to improve them you get.
- isaacfrond 2y agoRead the whole article wondering how lonely people think differently. But I now understand that it is just that: different. They do not conform to what the norm thinks. Seen in that light: lonely people are lonely because they are weird. Right. Good to know.
- 127 2y agoLonely people are also weird because they are lonely (and don't get the calibration from human interaction).
- kaffekaka 2y agoThe article does not claim this nor support the claim. It merely says that loneliness is associated with being "weird". No causality.
- Oarch 2y agoIt's possible to reverse this and infer the more mainstream your thoughts of these celebrities, the more popular you are / will be.
- darkerside 2y agoWell, exactly. Parents poster is pointing out that the cause is ambiguous. Actually, technically, they are attributing causality to the opposite direction, but in practice, I'd say it gets the point across.
- viciousvoxel 2y agoMy intuition is that it goes both ways and it's a feedback loop/downward spiral.
- wigglyartichoke 2y agoYes, a social feedback loop, but the internal feedback loop is what causes the downward spiral
- dinkblam 2y ago> Loneliness corresponded with idiosyncratic [unusual, unique] neural representations of celebrities as well as more idiosyncratic communication about celebrities must be the best argument to date for being more lonely.
- ANewFormation 2y agoCould mean the opposite of what you might think. I imagine the mean perception of Zuck is weirdo, Bieber is 'no clue, I'm not a teen girl' and so on.
- bawolff 2y agoI mean, if you get to enjoy a pop star that society normally relegates to teen girls, that seems like a positive to me. (I don't particularly like bieber, but if he's your jam, don't let society get in the way)
- portaouflop 2y agoPeople are strange when you’re a stranger.
- grvbck 2y ago> Lonelier individuals were also more likely to use unusual language when describing well-known celebrities and to describe them in ways that were not typical for their group. How is that surprising? If they are lonely, they are not part of the group and intergroup communication (including shared values, opinions, gossip etc). The text fails to define "unusual" in a meaningful way other than "not part of the majority". It's like saying "we found that the minority tends to vote differently than the majority".
- gilleain 2y agoIndeed, I struggle to even imagine what "use unusual language when describing well-known celebrities" even means! Maybe like using "musician" rather than "artist" or some other combination? edit: Ok, I've read through the paper, and still have no idea. Apparently the responses to questions were compared as semantic vectors using cosine similarity in Google’s Universal Sentence Encoder space. Or something lol.
- adammarples 2y agoVery unsurprising but perhaps still valid research that needs to be done to be known. A better conclusion might have been: increasing socialisation increases homogeneity of language use.
- quesera 2y agoThis rings true to me. You can infer (with various degrees of fidelity) a lot about people by their communication patterns: age, gender, education, hobbies, reading habits, news sources, place of origin or residence. And obviously, socialization. This study suggests socialization is a(n inverse) proxy for loneliness, and there's surely some truth to that, but it is not the same thing.
- throw310822 2y agoSo they tested disconnected individuals against connected individuals in the perception of socially constructed objects (celebrities). And they found that people who don't socialise much don't share that socially constructed perception. What else did they expect? Seems quite obvious.
- TeMPOraL 2y agoExactly. To highlight: the point of social objects like celebrities is to bond over them with other people. Obviously, lonely people do less of that.
- kordlessagain 2y agoFeels like fancy neuroimaging being used to scientifically justify excluding people who don't conform to mainstream social norms. Classic case of using tech to medicalize being different. Also kind of makes sense from an evolutionary psych perspective - groups have always tried to identify and push out "others" for survival. But maybe in 2024 we can do better than using million-dollar brain scanners to shame people who see the world (oh sorry, “famous” people) differently?
- TekMol 2y agoDo you guys know who the most popular artists of our time are? Reading this article and its mention of celebrities I was like "Who are today's celebrities anyhow?"? And typed most popular artists 2024 into Google. It came back with: Taylor Swift The Weeknd Lady Gaga Drake Karol G Bruno Mars Beyoncé Eminem Charli XCX Harry Styles I have heard 8 of the 10 names before. Never heard about "Karol G" and "Charli XCX". I can only think of one song performed by one of them: "Paparazzi" by Lady Gaga. Does that make me very disconnected with today's culture?
- Modified3019 2y agoI’m 4/10 on that one as far as name recognition. Similar to you, I can only could think of one song from lady Gaga. Eminem is the only one which multiple songs come to mind, not that I could name them. I grew up on 90’s and early 2000’s college radio, and am now a Doom/psychedelic rock kind of guy, and spend a good amount of time and money curating what I love. I am disconnected from pop culture. It has repeatedly failed to deliver what I enjoy, and typically comes bundled with advertisements so I have no reason to pay attention to it.
- keiferski 2y agoI don’t listen to 8/10 of these musicians, but I’ve heard of all of them except for Karol G. So yeah; I’d say you are very disconnected.
- mapt 2y agoPeople who don't interact a lot with other people. Hrrm. It would be really weird if they thought and talked in accordance with the current social pablum.
- cjaackie 2y agoInteresting premise but did this article _feel_ off to anyone else? Maybe it was me , but did it seem a bit redundant while also not saying a whole lot?
- mgraybosch 2y ago[dead]
- RadiozRadioz 2y agoProbably written by a lonely person. It expresses things in unusual ways and has repetition that is not typical when compared to articles written by non-lonely people.
- FranklinMaillot 2y agoExactly. It looks like it was written by a very bad LLM. It keeps repeating the title over and over again.
- le-mark 2y ago> The second study was an online survey conducted with 923 Amazon Mechanical Turk workers, whose average age was 40 years. So psychology is now the study of mice, college freshman, and mechanical Turks? I have not seen this before.
- svnt 2y agoIt is very common. There are lines of research on dealing with the shortcomings of using mturk this way. e.g. https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/521AEEB9A9753D5C6038440BD123826C/S2049847020000060a.pdf/the-shape-of-and-solutions-to-the-mturk-quality-crisis.pdf https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/c...
- dijksterhuis 2y ago> Interestingly, the study also revealed a particularly strong consensus among participants regarding the neural representations of Justin Bieber compared to the other four celebrities. is this academic speak for “yeah…… that guy…… nope.”?
- blueflow 2y agoI'm disgusted that they took celebrity gossip as reference point for healthy social behavior.
- criddell 2y agoI don't think the article says that, does it?
- blueflow 2y agoThe consumption of boulevard media is implied, either directly or via friends.
- criddell 2y agoBoulevard media? The article mentions a popular musical artist. Are there popular artists whose work you have an opinion on? Well then as soon as you express those thoughts, you are talking about a celebrity and this study says the way you talk about it may reveal something about you.
- blueflow 2y agoI have no TV, no radio, no tiktok and no facebook. I don't know much about the people in there.
- criddell 2y agoSurely you recognize that you are an outlier then. Most people have some opinions on at least one popular musician or actor or writer. If you don't, then I'm a little envious. There's so much great stuff out there waiting for you to discover it. I'd recommend checking out the Beatles.
- blueflow 2y agoI'm not missing out, I'm not interested in the persons. And i don't think I'm an outlier. Some people find other meanings in life than watching others.
- thrance 2y agoSo many words used to convey so little meaning, what a waste of time. How do they think differently about celebrities, why, and is it a bad thing in and of itself?
- zug_zug 2y ago> Lonely individuals tend to think and talk in an unusual way, study finds That's not really what this article finds... the title is "Loneliness corresponds with neural representations and language use that deviate from shared cultural perceptions", but even that title is too general when it's only talking about a handful of pop-culture celebrities. And also, remember when a researcher says "loneliness" they mean "self-reported loneliness," I know a lot of people with very little companionship who might insist they are a 0 out of 10 on the loneliness scale. There's so many different ways to interpret this data: Perhaps people who are willing to admit they are lonely (usually something that's very mildly frowned upon in my experience) are more willing to break with social norms. Or perhaps having wild takes on reality results in you becoming lonelier. Or perhaps a few outlier individuals really pushed the average. Or perhaps people who are less lonely are generally more knowledgeable/well-informed about these individuals. Etc etc.
- TeMPOraL 2y agoAll of what you mentioned looks like a possible contributing factor, but this one stood out to me: > Or perhaps people who are less lonely are generally more knowledgeable/well-informed about these individuals. I'd go as far as saying, people who are less lonely are more interested in those individuals in the first place. Celebrities are social objects. There's nothing inherently interesting in life or personality of any specific celebrity - what makes them interesting is that other people know about them too, so discussing them is a way to bond with others, have fun, etc. Lonely people do less of that, so they have less of a motivation to care about celebrities in the first place.
- gilleain 2y agoYes, from the Discussion section of the paper: > Prior work even finds that celebrities that generate common ground between strangers are disproportionately discussed in conversation, suggesting shared celebrity knowledge can provide a “foot in the door” to forming ties with others Heh, I know that studying obvious things is the "bread and butter" of scientific study, but it's still funny to read sometimes... "Hello, fellow coworkers! How about the local sports team, did you see them play last night?"
- ksymph 2y agoThe article has some weird stuff in it which makes the whole thing seem ridiculous (did we really need two paragraphs detailing the effects of loneliness?). The paper frames it much better: https://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3 https://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3
- dwpdwpdwpdwpdwp 2y agohttps://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3 https://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3 The original article this one links to is a better read.
- hasbot 2y agoThe linked article is a summary of a much longer article (https://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3 https://www.nature.com/articles/s44271-024-00088-3). From the conclusion of the original article: > Shared reality fosters social connections between people and increases confidence in one’s knowledge because it is corroborated by others. While lonely individuals report feeling disconnected from others in terms of their interests and ideas it was previously unclear to what extent this is true with respect to the zeitgeist—defined here as the widely shared perceptions between members of contemporary culture. I kinda get what they were looking for but knowledge and description of "celebrities" seems like a poor metric for many reasons including somebody just not interested in celebrities. For example, one can be lonely but online all day and so very connected to the "zeitgeist." Or one can have many interactions with other people but never discuss celebrities. But, ignoring all that, the headline suggested that loneliness alters something in the brain akin to how blindness alters ones view of reality. Or maybe it's the different way of thinking and talking that leads to loneliness.
- tomcam 2y agoMy kids grew up with no TV and no Internet until they were 12 or so. When they applied at a Microsoft-area private school one question asked what celebrity they like and why. They knew of none and didn’t even know the word celebrity.
- zx90 2y agoThere is a minor but growing trend of schools (even whole countries, see Australia) banning social media or smartphones for under-16s. I tentatively agree. Are your kids now overly impressed/influenced by celebrities or influencers? Do they build and value close relationships among themselves and others?
- tomcam 2y agoMy kids are not impressed by celebrity culture whatsoever, though they do support artists they like. They spent half their lives living next to celebrities. Not a speck of interest. They are both very good at building and maintaining relationships. They’re in their twenties and have no social media presence.
- joshuanapoli 2y agoI wonder if loneliness improves (at least correlates) creativity. Can I make myself inventive by becoming lonely?
- bawolff 2y agoLonliness is also correlated with depression which i think would be pretty bad for creativity. Maybe there is a fine line.
- ashoeafoot 2y agoYou can hijack your longing for love and companionship sure.
- alfiedotwtf 2y agoAnyone else find that article repeating itself over and over without getting to the damn point?
- spuds 2y agoAs someone who's considered himself lonely for most of his life, I can very much relate with the idea of feeling like an outcast, like an alien, someone who doesn't really fit in or understand what others find interest in. I think, in my case at least, it was probably related to being told over and over as I kid that I was doing everything wrong, that I wasn't acting manly enough, etc. Being told I didn't fit in led me to believe it. After a long journey of rebuilding my self-worth, I'm a lot less lonely this days, but I still feel it pulling at me, especially when I'm in a situation where I feel like an outsider.
- htk 2y agoI'm a state that resonates a lot with what you wrote, thank you for that. Checking out your bio I found out you have a very interesting blog, I really liked "Unexpected Benefits of Being Vulnerable on the Internet" as it's something that I often wonder about, how we condition ourselves to say things we believe will be accepted (and to receive upvotes) instead of what we truly feel, leaving our true self behind.
- aaron695 2y ago[dead]
- ErigmolCt 2y agoThank you for sharing something so personal and honest. Your story highlights how loneliness isn’t just about physical isolation
- pcdoodle 2y agoAaron's right, you have a cool blog. His account here is so over censored.
- VyseofArcadia 2y ago> five well-known celebrities (Justin Bieber, Ellen DeGeneres, Kim Kardashian, Barack Obama, and Mark Zuckerberg) It feels weird to me to bundle a tech CEO and a former President of the United States in with a pop idol, a talk show host, and a reality TV influencer as "celebrities".
- williamdclt 2y agoWhy? They're all undeniably celebrities, and I guess the point was to have a spread of source of celebrity?
- KittenInABox 2y agoWhy not? They are all celebrities. Celebrity status is not really correlated to the actual work they do [although some work requires some notoriety]. Gordon Ramsey's a restaurant owner and chef but he's also been on reality TV. Malala became internationally famous for being the target of an assassination plot, not her years of advocacy for women's education beforehand.
- johnnyanmac 2y agoas a simple comparison: would Harold (of "hide the pain" fame) be considered a celebrity? what about Linus Torvald, or heck: Linus Sebastian? I'm simply curious, I don't really know what line we have between what is "local icon" and when we call someone "celebrity".
- brokegrammer 2y ago> Chronic loneliness is linked to mental health issues like depression and anxiety, as well as physical health problems, including weakened immunity, cardiovascular disease, and an increased risk of mortality. A lot of pshycologists make that claim but I haven't found any compelling studies that prove it. Depression and axiety is understandable because we're social animals but the physical aspect isn't convincing unless the socially isolated person is lying around in bed doing drugs and eating unhealthy food all day. In that case instead of loneliness, we should blame drug abuse. It's unclear whether drug use is causing social isolation or if the latter is causing drug use. All the studies I've seen so far have weak evidence and most of them don't address confounding factors. I'm no scientist but I'd appreciate if someone could point to studies with strong evidence about this claim.
- diath 2y agoDepression and anxiety cause elevated cortisol levels which cause all kinds of physically measurable issues.
- consteval 2y agoJust guessing here, but if you're depressed you're much less likely to take your health seriously. It's also much easier to abuse drug when you're lonely - look at drug use among the homeless. Certainly, if I took away your friends and family I would expect your health to decline.
- brokegrammer 2y ago> Depression and anxiety cause elevated cortisol levels which cause all kinds of physically measurable issues. I hadn't thought about it that way. I suppose elevated cortisal causes a kind of domino effect that ends up with deteriorated overall health. > Just guessing here, but if you're depressed you're much less likely to take your health seriously. It's also much easier to abuse drug when you're lonely - look at drug use among the homeless. > Certainly, if I took away your friends and family I would expect your health to decline. This makes sense. I haven't been considering the general population because I consider myself a lonely person since I spend most of my time coding and reading books but that's now how most lonely people would be classified. Many are homeless and in much worse circumstances than I am. I shouldn't be using myself as an example for that reason.
- kstenerud 2y agoHmm... I don't know anything about 2 of the 5 celebrities other than their names. Ellen somethingorother I've never even heard of.
- whoisstan 2y agoIs the reverse true as well? Unusual preferences can lead to lonliness?
- johnnyanmac 2y agoSeems logical. If you're into medieval re-enactments, you'll have a much harder time connecting with people than being into the NFL. It'll be a blast once you find that group, but you're finding a needle in a haystack. It's a bit why there's common advice (that I'm ambivalent on) in "if you're lonely, get a dog". Not just for the social factor, but because dogs are an almost universally loved pet and instant icebreaker for other pet owners or pet lovers. that first step to socialization is harder than ever.
- houseplant 2y agoonly if you aren't keen to share them with your friends. if you watch an obscure show or movie or read a rare book, most people will be eager to share it with their friends, and their friends will be eager to learn about it. It's not the preferences or experiences that make you lonely, it's whether you trust your friends enough to share them. truly, nothing is more fun than finding a cool movie and then showing your pals, who then also love it. That's the best!
- marcuskane2 2y agoFrom the article: "lonely individuals tend to perceive that their ideas are not shared by others" I wonder how the current loneliness epidemic is intertwined with our current social/political climate and "us vs them" polarization. I suspect almost everyone has some secret disagreements with their in-group, even if only by a matter of degree, but are afraid to voice that opinion. There have to be tens of millions of Americans who identify as a INSERT_POLITICAL_IDENTITY but disagree with some aspect of that group's platform, narrative or goals. It's a wonder that anyone doesn't feel like their ideas are not shared by others.
- lazyeye 2y agoYeah I think this is the end result of defining people more by their group membership than who they are as individuals.
- bluefirebrand 2y ago> I suspect almost everyone has some secret disagreements with their in-group This is assuming they have anyone close enough to even call them an in-group I think there has been an over-emphasis on individuality and a strong resistance to conformity that has been instilled in a lot of people, which has led to a lot of those people cutting ties with anyone that has even minor disagreements with them They are forever in search of their perfect friend group that doesn't exist, made up of only people who agree with them about every single thing
- mmsc 2y agoIt's quite amazing how many people call themselves "free thinkers" to mean they have unique ideas, yet those ideas usually align with a huge percentage of the population.
- hindsightbias 2y agoHow can it be hip if everyone is doing it? I just call them normies of a different flavor. They don't like that.
- Izkata 2y ago
- pragma_x 2y agoMaybe I'm misunderstanding the abstract here, but doesn't this also suggest that lonely individuals more readily reach their own conclusions about common ideas and concepts? I can't get away from the thought that all this confirms is that groups tend to converge their thinking and speech through regular contact, and that different social groups (including groups of one) will diverge in thinking over time.
- houseplant 2y agowell, it didn't say their descriptions were WRONG, just different. The insinuation is that highly social people were informed by what their peers think and say, so their descriptions will likely mirror other socially connected people. The lonely people would just have to come up with it on their own. I know there's a tendency to dismiss groupthink as negative and wrong and bad, and for huge amounts of people that's true, but for small social groups it's often a sign that you've all become familiar with each other, experienced the same things and are just similar in general, and in terms of selecting for safety, these are all markers of who you will likely feel safest with. there's a hypothesis that singing and instrument usage like drums came about as a way for a community to show cohesiveness and immediately find out who strangers are. By the time you've learned their songs you're not a stranger anymore, but if you can't sing or talk like they do, you're very likely a stranger to be wary of. Makes a lot of societal evolutionary sense.
- grantmuller 2y ago"Our findings provide evidence that loneliness is associated with deviations from the zeitgeist, specifically when it comes to perceptions of well-known celebrities" Soooooo... thinking differently than the majority of people may lead to loneliness, because those who think differently than the zeitgeist have a hard time connecting with the majority of people because of the way they think?
- bitwize 2y agoI find it strange that there's so much alignment in gen pop on how celebrities are perceived, and that any original opinion on these celebrities is considered "idiosyncratic". I feel like there's a Spiegelgrund being built somewhere for people who don't think Taylor Swift is the absolute cat's ass, because that means they're different and different is threatening. Also, what constitutes idiosyncratic neural representation of celebrities? Back when Britney Spears became huge, my nickname for her was "the succubus", after a contemporaneous episode of South Park in which Chef fell under the sway of a succubus when she sang "The Morning After" to him. Britney Spears was clearly an idiot, and she had a weak voice compared to other female singers, yet when people saw her gyrating and mewling on MTV'S TRL they went absolutely bonkers and I didn't get it. Is that idiosyncratic celebrity ideation?