Feeling lonely can be a brain predisposition

Find yourself alone and choose to stay there. There is a notable difference and it has to do with one’s mindset. And perhaps not only philosophically understood. According to a new study published in the journal Psychological science people who often feel alone they would think and process information from the world around them differently, without taking into consideration the actual size of one’s social circles. Using brain scans a group of researchers in California have discovered brain responses that they would predispose some people to feelings of loneliness, even if in essence they interact regularly with others. A contradiction that can be explained precisely only with a different analysis of social information.

“We have discovered that lonely people are exceptionally different from the others in the way they process the world around them. Even taking into account the number of friends they have »she explained in a press release Elisa C. Baeka researcher at the University of Southern California and lead author of the study.

The team performed 90-minute functional magnetic resonance imaging to 63 first-year university students. During the brain scans, the participants watched 14 emotionally engaging video clips. They were later asked to report how socially connected they felt to others using the loneliness scale prepared by the university itself (here she is). The results were analyzed alongside those of a social networking survey the scientists had conducted earlier in the academic year. The survey had asked people to list the names of each of their fellow students, people they ate with on a regular basis, and those they dated in their first few months as college students.

The people were then divided into two groups: that of lonelymade up of volunteers who had scored high results on the loneliness scale, and that of not lonely and socially involved who instead had obtained low results in the indicator. By cross-referencing the results with brain scans, the study authors then noted differences in brain activity between the two groups: These differences were mainly noted in two areas. First of all in the so-called default-mode network, i.e. the basic modality of the brain, a set of specific neural circuits that fire together when we are not busy performing specific tasks (but also in the brain activity associated with the interpretation of narratives and friendships) and in reward processing areas of the brain within the cortex-basal ganglia-thalamus circuit. The team therefore came to the conclusion that lonely people process situations in a particular way than otherswhich may explain why some may not feel understood and therefore excluded.

“One possibility is that lonely people do not find value in the same aspects of situations or scenes as others This can result in a belief-strengthening feedback loop where lonely people perceive themselves as different from others, which in turn can lead to further challenges in achieving social connection. Another interpretation of the results is the reversal of the cause and effect link and that is that loneliness itself can change the way a person thinks over time. Understanding more about how lonely people think would not only promote shared understanding, but would also identify new areas to address loneliness-related issues more effectively.

What happens when loneliness is forced and not a choice?

Sos loneliness: raise your hand if you suffer from FOBA