Loneliness is a growing concern for all ages especially as a symptom of depression. Researchers from California and Italy studied middle-aged and older adults to discover its correlation with wisdom.
Many experts believe that there are two ongoing pandemics - the first being coronavirus with physical symptoms, and the second and more silent one is loneliness, a behavioral epidemic. Moreover, due to lockdown and safety measures of physical isolation and quarantine, social isolation has caused increased loneliness, triggering depression, anxiety, and other behaviors.
The study is a collaboration between the University of California San Diego and the University of Rome. Their findings suggest that wisdom may protect people from loneliness during adulthood.
In a 2009 study on social isolation and cognition, researchers discovered that loneliness can have severe negative effects on health. Social isolation and loneliness may be risk factors for cognitive decline and other negative impacts on emotions and behavior. However, loneliness and social isolation are not always the same thing.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, almost one-third of adults live along but are not lonely or socially isolated. On the other hand, some people who have a social circle experience severe loneliness.
Wisdom & Loneliness
From a recent study, Dr. Dilip Jeste from UC San Diego shared that people with more "wisdom were less lonely and vice versa." In general, loneliness was associated with poor health, sleep quality, and less happiness. At the same time, the opposite "was generally true for wisdom."
The team used the Loneliness Scale and Wisdom Scale to measure each factor in adults between 50 and 65 and those over 90 years old. Results of the four groups from San Diego, California, and Cilento, Italy showed an inverse relationship between wisdom and loneliness despite contrasting cultures.
Dr. Salvatore Di Somma from the Unversity of Rome shared how American adults in the study came from urban and suburban areas while Italian participants came from a southern rural region. Despite differences in historical, educational, and socioeconomic backgrounds, Di Somma explained, their results were very similar.
Jeste explained that wisdom and loneliness are personality traits. "Most personality traits are partially inherited and partially determined by [the] environment."
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Increasing Compassion
Wisdom is composed of multiple factors including compassion, empathy, balanced emotions, and self-awareness. Those with high levels of empathy and compassion were the least lonely, according to the researchers.
Dr. David Brenner from UC San Diego shared that increasing a person's compassion would likely increase their wisdom as well so that loneliness would decrease. The team is interested in "in enhancing empathy and compassion to reduce levels of stress and improve happiness and well-being."
Discovering how to decrease loneliness as people get older may be useful in developing effective interventions of treating loneliness, especially as a symptom of mental illness. Jeste shared that methods such as cognitive behavioral therapy may increase someone's compassion and decrease loneliness.
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