Instant Genius - How loneliness can affect your health, and what you can do to combat it, with Prof Andrea Wigfield

Episode Date: July 16, 2023

A recent study found that nearly 50 per cent of adults in the UK reported having feelings of loneliness, at least occasionally. It’s a fairly shocking stat, but what effect is this having on our collective health? In this episode we catch up Prof Andrea Wigfield, director of the Centre for Loneliness Studies at Sheffield Hallam University. She tells about the different types of loneliness we can feel, the risks it poses to our mental and physical health and what we can do to limit its impact. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for Citizens Bank. Peak pollination season, and my business is scaling fast. To keep the nectar flowing, I need a phone plan with top priority data speed. That's why I chose GoogleFi wireless. My connections stay strong even when the hive is buzzing.

Plus, unlimited plans started $35 a month. Now that's a deal that doesn't stay. Explore GoogleFi Wireless plans today. Plus taxes and government fees. GoogleFi Wireless is not subject to data traffic deprioritization during times of high network usage. You said this place was steps from the water. We just haven't found the steps yet. How much did we save?

Enough. Enough to get lost. Or you could book a stay with Hilton. Welcome to your oceanfront room. Just steps from the water. The Hilton sale is on now. Book on Hilton.com or the Hilton app and save up to 20% to get the stay you expected.

When you want savings, not surprises. It matters where you stay. Hilton, for the stay. This podcast is sponsored by name, audio and focal. Streaming has made music more accessible than ever, but true listening is about more than ease. It's about quality. British audio experts name audio,

alongside French acoustic specialist focal, combine handcrafted tradition with cutting-edge innovation and high-end materials, delivering digital precision with analogue warmth. So you can experience exceptional sound at home. Music just as the artist intended. Visit name audio.com to learn more. Hello and welcome to Instant Genius, a bite-sized masterclass in podcast form. I'm Jason Goodyear, commissioning editor at BBC Science Focus magazine.

A recent study found that nearly 50% of adults in the UK reported feelings of blown at least occasionally. It's a fairly shocking stat, but what effect is loneliness having on our collective health? In this episode, we catch up with Professor Andrea Wigfield, Director for the Centre for Loneliness Studies at Sheffield Hallam University. She tells us about the different types of loneliness we can feel, the risks it poses to our mental and physical health, and what we can do to limit its impact. So you're a researcher that studies loneliness. So that's quite an interesting topic of research. Is there a strict scientific definition for what we mean when we say loneliness? Yeah, that's a really interesting question. So there have been lots of academic and policy

discussion actually as well about the definition of loneliness. And I think over the years, one of the problem has been that people have not really distinguished between social isolation and loneliness and those two terms have been used interchangeably. But more recently, especially academics have started to really think about what these two terms mean and try and distinguish between the two so we can arrive at some clear definitions. So what we've come to now in terms of conclusions about these are that social isolation is widely thought to be a lack or an absence of social contacts. So that's more of an objective, quantitative count or measure of the number of social

contacts a person has. So it might be measured, for example, by how many people you see or speak to in a given week. Whereas when we think about loneliness, that's much more subjective. And it's really a more unpleasant feeling that people have. And that emerges when someone has fewer social contacts or fewer social relationships than they actually want or desire. So this means that people can be surrounded by others, so they're not really socially isolated, but they can still feel lonely. But at the same time, people can be socially isolated, so they have a low number of social contacts, but they don't necessarily feel lonely. And I think the most frequently cited definition of loneliness, the sort of definition that most people now accept was put forward by two authors

called Daniel Pearlman and Literature Peplow. And it was around 1980, I think, when they put their definition forward. And that still holds today as the best definition of loneliness. So they explain that loneliness is a negative feeling, which emerges from a lack or loss of meaningful social relationships. And they say that loneliness can be experienced when there's an imbalance as well between the relationships a person has and the relationships a person desires. but also that loneliness can emerge when people feel that their relationships are poorer

when they compare the relationships to the peers. I think that one of the issues currently today is that many young people compare their relationships to other young people by looking on social media. So if a young person sees another young person that appears to have lots of friends on social media or there are lots of photographs of them meeting it with others, it can actually make the person that feels they have less social relationships, even more lonely. But of course, because of the way social media is,

we don't actually know what the reality is behind these images. So I think this is one of the contributing factors to why young people today feel more lonely, which we might come on to a bit later. And the last point to mention about the definition of loneliness is there are different types of loneliness that have been defined by academics as well. So the two main different types of loneliness

are social loneliness and emotional loneliness. Social loneliness is where there's an absence of a social network of other people. So that might be a network of friends or it could even be work colleagues. Whereas emotional loneliness is where there's an absence of a close emotional attachment. That could be a close friend,

but it might be a relative or it could even be, and most often is, romantic partner. So this is obviously a big question, but what do we know about why humans feel lonely? So explanations about why humans feel lonely tend to come mainly from psychologists and neuroscientists. And they often see loneliness from a kind of evolutionary perspective. And there's one key neuroscientist called John Caciopo, who sees loneliness as a neurological reaction. So a bit like hunger is a signal to humans that they need to eat.

He sees loneliness as a signal to people that they need to improve the social situation and to seek out other people that they can connect with. So in the short term, a neuroscientist and psychologists don't really see loneliness as a problem, but more of a signal to make a change in their social relationships. This short-term loneliness is called transient loneliness. Like I said, transient loneliness is temporary. It might occur due to a life change, for example, and there are a number of different life changes

that can happen to cause transient loneliness. In the research that we've carried out at Sheffield-Hallam, we call these transient occurrences as at life transition points, and there are a number of life transition points that individuals can encounter over the life course that can cause transient loneliness. So, for example, it might involve changing schools or when young people move out of home for the first time to university. It might be moving jobs, moving home.

People who migrate will feel transient loneliness. Often parents, where their children leave home for the first time, the so-called empty nesters, they might experience transient loneliness. Or it might be when you have a change in employment status, for example, if you become unemployed or retired, or even carers can experience transient loneliness where they have less time at particular periods to maintain their social connections with other people. Now, although transient loneliness is not pleasant and people don't necessarily enjoy the feeling of being lonely at that time, psychologists don't really see this as a problem.

They see it is an inherent part of our human nature as social beings. And like I said earlier, it leads to a signal to that person to connect with others and to maybe start investing some time or effort into building relationships. But the problem occurs when this transient loneliness stays over a longer period of time. And if it isn't resolved, it can lead to chronic loneliness. Now, chronic loneliness is much more worrying and it's much more difficult to escape from. And with chronic loneliness, people can develop negative perceptions of themselves. and they can perceive other people's perceptions of them in a negative way as well. And that tends to lead to a downward spiral effect,

and it makes people's loneliness feel worse, and they're much more less likely then to reach out to connect with other people. And that kind of chronic loneliness is the loneliness that can lead to mental and physical health conditions, which we might talk about a bit later. Because chronic loneliness can lead to this downward spiral effect, this is where it's really important to intervene, so to try and prevent transient loneliness from becoming chronic loneliness.

Yeah, so we're talking about social relationships here in essence. So we all have, you know, several different kinds of relationships. What actually classifies as a strong nourishing social relationship? So in terms of the kinds of relationships that are important for preventing or reducing people's chances of becoming lonely, our research has shown that meaningful relationships or what we might call meaningful interactions are the most important kinds of social relationships. So for a strong social relationship, it's key is that it needs to be meaningful.

And we've actually written a paper in the Journal for Social Policy and Society, which discusses all the components that are required for a meaningful relationship. And in that paper, we put forward a definition of a meaningful relationship. So what we say is that for a meaningful relationship, it needs to have a number of components. So these are that it needs to be with people who are valued by the individual. You need to share a common goal or interest with that person. It needs to be positive. It needs to go beyond a superficial level.

So it needs to be a deeper relationship, not just a fleeting, passing by, comment from somebody. and it needs to be capable of sustainability in the long term. We've also started to research other types of meaningful relationships that play a role in loneliness as well. So these are not just meaningful relationships with other people, but actually meaningful relationships with places and with oneself as well. When we've looked at meaningful relationships, we've found that those three components are meaningful relationship with others,

a meaningful relationships with a place and a meaningful relationships with oneself are the key things that contribute to whether people feel lonely or not. So when we think about meaningful relationships with places, we're really thinking about the concept of having a sense of belonging. So that could be a sense of belonging to a sporting venue. It could be a football ground or maybe an athletics track. It might be an open space like a lake or a green space, maybe a skate park. or it could even be a building like a workplace or a shopping centre or a place of worship. Our research has shown that if people have a meaningful relationship with a place and a sense of belonging to that place, that can almost act as a buffer against loneliness.

So even if people don't have meaningful relationships with other people at that time, if they have a meaningful relationship with a place, that can really help prevent chronic loneliness. So the third kind of meaningful relationship that is important in terms of people's feelings of loneliness is around having a meaningful relationship with the oneself. So as I explained earlier, people who are chronically lonely might actually start to perceive small gestures or interactions with other people as negative. And they might also start to perceive themselves negatively too.

And if people, though, have a strong meaningful relationship with themselves in advance of this, than less likely to be adversely affected by loneliness or by the lack of social connections that they have with others. And in fact, people who have a more positive relationship with themselves and more positive meaningful relationship with themselves might even start to enjoy time and space of being alone. And often this is what we call solitude, and people will talk about solitude in a positive way,

whereas they talk about loneliness in a negative way. Obviously, you've covered a lot of different, areas there and it's very complicated and multifaceted. How do you go about studying it? Yeah, that's a really good question. There are a number of ways of studying loneliness. Most commonly, loneliness is measured quantitatively through statistical measurement scales. And a scale is really just a way of numerically measuring an opinion or an emotion. There are two main scales that have been developed and tested and validated over time to assess how lonely people are. The first one is the De Jong-Javeld scale, and that's named after a Dutch

professor who designed the scale. And the second one is a UCLA scale. And that one, as its name suggests, was developed in the University of California in Los Angeles. The De Jong-Javelle scale includes ways to measure both social and emotional loneliness. But the UCLA scale is the one that we most frequently use in our research. It was developed a number of years ago back in the 1970s and it originally included 20 questions which could be asked to assess if and how lonely a person is. Now over time the scale's been refined and changed and now there's a shortened version of the scale which includes just three questions. That three item scale is the one that's recommended by the UK government's national learning strategy as well. And there are three questions

in this UCLA shortened three items scale. So it asks, how often do you feel like companionship? How often do you feel left out and how often do you feel isolated from others? And the UCLA scale is really popular, so it's used across the world now. There are three options for people to respond to those three questions, so it's a bit like a multiple choice. and they can either respond hardly ever, some of the time and often. And as part of that, then, there are scores given one for hardly ever, two for some of the time and three for often. And then those scores are added up, and the higher the total score, the more lonely the person is judged to be. Now, alongside that scale, there's also a single question as well that the UK government suggests that we ask,

which is how often do you feel lonely with options of hardly ever, never or some of the time or often. And by combining the UCLA three items scale with that single question about how often do you feel lonely, we can get a quite good accurate assessment of how lonely people feel. And because the UCLA scale is used across the world

in many studies and it's also used in large surveys, it means that we can compare people's loneliness in different locations, or we might be able to compare the effects of different kinds of services and the effects they have on reducing loneliness. But that's not to say that any of the scales are without problems and challenges. And I think one of the issues is that we're using a quantitative scale to measure a subjective feeling.

So that's always going to be slightly problematic. One of the issues with the UCLA scale in particular is it uses quite negative wording. So as I said, things like how often do you feel you lack companionship? How often do you feel left out? How often do you feel isolated from others? And because of that negative wording, it can lead what we refer to in social sciences a response set. So that's where people, the participants,

might give the same answer to each of the questions without really thinking about what they've been asked. We've also found that when we've used the UCLA scale in some of our research, that some of the participants can find the questions a bit upsetting because they actually remind them of just how lonely they feel. And we've also found that some of the scales don't work so well with some ethnic minority groups as well, where some of the terms that are used, for example, feeling left out, can have different meanings in different cultures,

so it doesn't necessarily accurately reflect that they feel lonely. The other difficulty we've had in using these quantitative measurement scales is that they can vary even when we explore one individual's experience. So we found that when we asked one person if they feel lonely on the scale, it might give a certain result. But then if we carry out more qualitative interviews and ask in-depth questions, they may not emerge as lonely as what it suggests on the scale or might even not be lonely. at all. So because of those difficulties in using the scales, we try and do a mix of different kinds of research. So we try and mix quantitative research alongside more qualitative research. So the scales are really good because they can help us compare across countries and within countries, across regions, across different kinds of initiatives that are designed to reduce

learning us. But at the same time, we need really to have more qualitative discussions and analysis of people's feelings so we can get a deeper understanding of how they're lonely and what that means for them. No one goes to Hank's for his spreadsheets. They go for a darn good pizza. Lately though, the shop's been quiet. So Hank decides to bring back the $1 slice. He asks co-pilot in Microsoft Excel to look at his sales and costs. To help him see if he can can afford it. Co-pilot shows Hank where the money's going and which little extras make the dollar slice work.

Now, Hank says, line out the door. Hank makes the pizza. Co-Pilot handles the spreadsheets. Learn more at M365, copilot.com slash work. When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use indeed sponsored jobs. It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications, and more.

Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a $75-sponsored job credit at Indeed.com slash podcast. That's Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. This podcast is sponsored by Name, Audio and Focal. With over 100 years of combined expertise, Name and Focal have been bringing music to listeners, just as the artist intended. Since day one,

this mantra has shaped every innovation in high-fi design, technology, and acoustic engineering, balancing craftsmanship and tradition with pioneering thinking. Name Audio pushes cutting-edge technology to ensure digital precision whilst sustaining Pratt,

pace, rhythm and timing, the elusive quality that makes music feel alive and gives it emotional texture. Today, in partnership with French acoustic, specialist focal, name audio creates systems that deliver exceptional sound and unforgettable listening experiences at home. Try it for yourself at a focal powered by name boutique. Visit focal powered by name.com for more information. Yeah, so if someone listening to this is thinking that sounds interesting

and it's perhaps a field that they'd like to get into themselves, how would they go about that, you know? How did you begin studying it? Well, I've spent much of my... academic career researching what we might loosely call marginalised groups and I've spent a lot of time looking at and evaluating interventions to support different groups. Now that's changed over the years so I've carried out research for example with teenage parents with South Asian women who've been excluded from the labour market. I've carried out research with young people who are not in education, employment and training, and with carers who are caring informally for a friend or relative. And what happened is about 10 years ago, I was commissioned to carry out some research

on another group of potentially marginalised people, older people. And I started to carry out more and more research with older people. And although the research wasn't designed to explore loneliness or social isolation, the issues that care is. kept coming up time and time again as I was talking to older people and as we were carrying out research tend to end up discussing loneliness. A good example of this was some research that I carried out for age UK. So they implemented an intervention called Fit for the Future. Now Fit for the Future was designed to improve physical activity and well-being of older people. But when we evaluated Fit for the Future, one of the main benefits of the program was that

actually older people were meeting other like-minded people and felt less isolated and lonely. And that seemed to be a key issue. And the more and more that I started researching older people, the more this issue of loneliness emerged. And I really got interested in exploring it and trying to understand it. And especially for me, trying to think about how we can design strategies to reduce loneliness, but also involve the people who are experiencing loneliness in designing those strategies. And the other thing that got me interested in it is earlier on in my career, much before I got involved in research, I had thought about being a town planner at one point because I've always been interested in thinking about how the design of places can influence as people's

wellbeing. I, as I delved more into loneliness, that actually became apparent that planning and design and architecture can influence how lonely people feel as well. If you have a well-designed area where people can meet and feel safe and can interact with other people, they're less likely to be lonely. So in essence, I suppose, an earlier career plan that I'd had came together with research that I was carrying out with older people and the two came together. So the thing that you hear a lot is that loneliness is increasing in Western society, at least anyway. So first off, is that true? And if so, do we know why? I don't think that there's necessarily a clear pattern emerging yet anyway of a long-term trend towards increased loneliness.

I think, as I've said, loneliness has always existed. People have always felt lonely and people will always feel lonely. It's a basic human response, as I've said, to having a lack of desired social connections. But I think that what has happened over the years, especially recently, there's been a number of things that have happened. in relation to loneliness that have given it more prominence and more publicity. So I think the first that there were a series of events that happened pre-COVID, so that meant that loneliness entered into the public discussion more. It was the Jo Cox Foundation.

Then there was a Minister for Loneliness. And coming out of that, there was the government's first national loneliness strategy. So it's become more on the radar publicly. But then there's been the COVID pandemic. And I think following on from that, that's really triggered discussions about loneliness for a few reasons, really. Firstly, obviously the pandemic and the requirement to isolate has triggered loneliness in itself.

But also, I think it's triggered some societal changes that were already taking place anyway, but have become more pronounced, which you've actually perhaps, extenuated people's experience of loneliness. So things like online shopping seems to have become much more popular, which means people are meeting face-to-face less. Remote working since COVID has become more widespread. There are more people working at home than ever before. And all these things reduce people's opportunities of face-to-face contact. So, you know, that important point I mentioned earlier about having a meaningful relationship with people, it's less likely if it's done remotely.

They might well be, and we might find in a few years, it might well be a long-term trend towards increase loneliness longer term. But I think at the moment, it's too early to say because of the pandemic, we don't know whether levels will settle down. But there certainly are, you know, there are large numbers of people lonely. I think there were some statistics in last year in 2022 that said nearly 50% of adults, which is around 25 million people in the UK, we reported to feel lonely occasionally sometimes, often or always. And I think it was about 4 million people in Great Britain were said to be experiencing chronic loneliness. So that's meaning that they were feeling lonely often or of all ways.

So obviously it is an issue and something we need to mind. monitor, don't think we can conclude too soon that it means it's definitely on the long-term rise. So let's have a look at the effects of loneliness then. So first off, I think on mental health, I think a lot of people would suspect this, but it's linked to all sorts of things, depression, sleep disorders, and even substance abuse. It's important to start by saying that loneliness is not a mental health problem itself. But we do know that loneliness and poor mental health are interlinked. So loneliness can lead to poor mental health, but likewise, poor mental health can lead to loneliness as well. And we know also that social connectedness, so the number and types

of connections you have with other people, does lead to greater well-being, which can promote better mental health. Now, there have been some studies where they've tried to disentangle the correlations between loneliness and mental health. And some of those have, as you said, showing a positive correlation between loneliness and poor mental health outcomes. So we found that people who are lonely are more likely to experience greater levels of anxiety

and depression, they're more likely to have problems with sleep, with alcohol abuse, and some other mental health disorders. And research specifically on older people who are lonely is shown that they have a higher propensity to suffer from conditions such as dementia, depression and even suicide.

And according to research, it was quite a few years ago now back in 2012, that research concluded that loneliness leads to a loss of hope and energy as well. So I think the key challenge around loneliness and mental health is really when we're researching it, is to be able to calculate and work out which comes first. is it the loneliness that's leading to the mental health condition or the mental health condition that's leading to loneliness? And that's something that's still evolving really

and research is still taking place to work out which comes before the other. So what's a bit more surprising perhaps is the effects that some studies have found that loneliness has on physical health. So there's one sort of headline-grabbing item there that said being lonely was as damaging to physical health as smoking 15. cigarettes a day? Yeah, again, there's quite a bit of research that does explore the health, the physical health implications of loneliness. And again, it's quite complex. And like mental health conditions, physical health conditions can trigger loneliness, but also loneliness can trigger

physical health conditions as well. So again, it's a two-way relationship and getting to the bottom of which leads the other is not always straightforward. There has been some research that are found lonely people produce inflammation and an increase in activity in the immune response. And there have been some other studies that have shown specific things like loneliness leading to a range of physical health conditions like heart disease, higher blood pressure, type 2 diabetes. I think there's been some links between loneliness and arthritis and even cancer. Now the study that you mentioned linking loneliness to smoking,

does tend to grab the headlines quite a lot. That study was carried out by Professor Julian Holt-Lundstad, and she's a professor in psychology and neuroscience in the USA, and she published some research in 2010, along with colleagues, which concluded that the health effect of loneliness is equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Now, I'll just tell you a bit about how she got to that conclusion. So her team came to this conclusion by doing something called a meta-analysis. And this is where you bring together a number of different studies.

So they did a meta-analysis, which included 148 studies, and they reported data from those studies on 300,000 participants. And they looked over a seven-and-a-half-year time period, so quite an extensive piece of work. And the researchers explored the extent to work. which social relationships can influence the risk of premature death by making correlations with those studies that they explored and looking at the data. And what they concluded from that research was that lonely people were 50% more likely

to die prematurely than people who had strong social relationships. And then they used a statistical tool, which is called the random effects models. and by using that they concluded that the influence of social relationships on the risk of death is comparable to a number of risk factors for death and one of those risk factors was smoking 15 cigarettes a day but they also pointed out that the health risk of the loneliness are similar to other risk factors of death so similar to alcohol consumption and that is calculated by drinking more than six drinks a day. physical inactivity and obesity. But I think that because the smoking and the link with cancer, etc.,

and death tends to grab the headlines, those are the risk factors where it's linked to physical inactivity, obesity and alcohol consumption tend to get missed. But certainly that research does show that there are strong physical health risks of being lonely. And even very recently it was mentioned, as you're probably aware of by the US Surgeon General, who again cited this link between smoking, the risk of smoking and loneliness. Yeah, so knowing that loneliness can be harmful to both our physical and mental health,

what can we do then, by way of summing up, what can we do to lessen its effect? Firstly, for those who are feeling, might be feeling lonely themselves, and secondly, for those that aren't, but would like to help someone who they think is. Well, I think the first thing that, again, we need to think about when we're thinking about how we help people who are lonely. The first thing is to, again, recognize that loneliness is a normal part of life, and it's something that most of us will face at some points in our lives. And most of that time, loneliness will be temporary. So it won't be something that lasts forever, and we don't need to worry about it too much. but sometimes as I've said

when those feelings of loneliness don't go and the loneliness becomes chronic that's when we really need to think about it so I think the first thing we need to do is really raise awareness about loneliness so that people who are feeling maybe lonely for longer than might be usual are encouraged to seek help

so I think that we need to raise awareness about loneliness so people who if they're feeling lonely than maybe is longer than what is usual, the inquiry to seek help. I think that like most things, prevention is usually better than cure. So at all times in our lives,

it's important that we engage in activities that we enjoy, that help us to have meaningful relationships, whether that's meeting other people or visiting places where we have a sense of belonging. And that way, when something does happen to trigger loneliness, we might be a bit more resilient to prevent it to becoming more long term. But we're not always going to be able to stop people from becoming chronically lonely. So when people are chronically lonely, there is still a lot of support available.

And there are a number of programmes and projects around the country in different places that are designed to reduce loneliness and people who feel lonely can go to them to get help from. Now often this support is provided by voluntary sector organisations. So age UK, for example, have a befriending scheme which operates across their local branches. And that's where older people can get linked up with another person who can be a friendly face. I think they offer that service online by telephone and face-to-face. The British Red Cross run a programme as well called Community Connectors, and that's for all ages, not just for older people.

and that consists of a 12-week person-centered program of support to help people who are experiencing loneliness and social isolation. And that program also is designed to connect people with their community as well. So they get their greatest sense of belonging and connection to the community. I've also been involved myself in evaluating a number of interventions designed to reduce loneliness. So one that was really effective was called Time to Show. Shine that was run by Leeds Older People's Forum in Leeds and it was funded by the National Lottery Community Fund and they ran a series of interventions for older people in Leeds which was really based on getting like-minded people together around activities that they were interested in so

dance, music related activities, eating together and the key to success of the Time to Shine program was it had offered activities which were tailored to people's needs and and desires, but it also brought light-minded people together. So once the programme had ceased, the people who had connected to it continued to form meaningful relationships with each other and met beyond the programme. Now there are also a number of technology-based interventions

that are emerging that people can access to help reduce loneliness. So there's one, again in Leeds, actually, by coincidence called Project Intimacy, and it's a WhatsApp immersive experience. And it's designed to make social connections, for people to make social connections with each other. And the way this runs is two people are randomly connected together

and over a 14-day period through using WhatsApp, it guides them through daily activities and tasks and directs them to do certain things over these 14 days so they can connect with each other. So they can go on a sort of a guided virtual walk in a park, for example, or they might have a guided tour around each other's homes. And I think the other thing to note is alongside these specific programs and projects that are designed to reduce loneliness,

there are simple things that individuals can do as well for themselves if they feel lonely or they might direct other people to do if they are aware of someone who feels lonely. So a simple and most obvious one is keeping busy, immersing yourself in work or gardening or domestic chores. Now, obviously, that's only a short-term temporary solution, and it's not something that is going to help you in the longer term. But I think if you do find yourself being lonely,

keeping busy is a good way to distract yourself from that. But then there are other things that you can do beyond that as well. So you might want to think about the places where you do have a sense of belonging to. I mentioned earlier about it might be a football ground, a place of worship, a favorite beach you've got. But if you can start to visit some places where you feel a sense of belonging, then that can help prevent you feeling lonely or even build up your resilience to being lonely. Another option is to participate in some voluntary work so that's a great way to get to know people whilst keeping busy

and some of our research has shown that people who volunteer and help out others, it gives them a sense of purpose and that in itself makes them feel less lonely and isolated. A last point to mention is that you might think, for example, about getting a pet. So there's also some research on the role that pets can play in reducing loneliness, so it could be a dog, a cat. We've even seen some research around henkeeping,

and now hen keeping can reduce loneliness. So there's an organisation called Equal Arts, based up in the North East, and they use hen keeping in care homes to help people, care home residents feel less lonely. The activities around looking after the hens, help the care homes residents come together to talk to each other, and also school children and other people are encouraged to come into the care homes to look at their hands and that helps them interact with the residents.

So I think there are a whole range of ways, either formal ways through programs and projects or other kinds of initiatives that people can engage with themselves to reduce the feelings of loneliness. Thank you for listening to this episode of Instant Genius. Brought to you from the team behind BBC Science Focus. That was Professor Andrea Wickfield, Director of the Centre for Learning the Studies at Sheffield Hallam University. The current issue of BBC Science Focus magazine is out now. Pick up a copy wherever you buy your favourite magazines

or download us on your preferred app store. You can also find us online at sciencefocus.com. This podcast is sponsored by Name, Audio and Focal. The texture and emotional depth of music can be lost through digital sources or poor signal. Name Audio believes you can have digital precision with analog warmth. Alongside French acoustic specialist focal, Name creates high-end audio systems, combining innovation with craftsmanship,

so you can listen to music, just as the artist intended. Discover more at name audio.com. Enjoy more ways to save at Ralph's, like low prices in every aisle. And when you download the Ralph's app, you can clip and save more with digital coupons every week. Plus, you can earn fuel points to save up to $1 per gallon at the pump. At Ralph's, you can enjoy more ways to save and more rewards every time you shop. So it's always easy to save big every day with savings and rewards. Ralph's SoCal for over 150 years.

Savings may vary by state. Fuel restrictions apply. See site for details. Did you know if your windows are bare, indoor temperatures can go up 20 degrees. Get ahead of summer with custom window treatments like solar roller shades from blinds.com and save up to 45% during the Memorial Day Early Access Sale. Whether you want to DIY it or have a pro handle everything, we've got you.

Free samples, real design experts, and zero pressure. Just help when you need it. Shop up to 45% off sitewide right now during the Early Access Memorial Day sale at blinds.com. Rules and restrictions apply.