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- [00:00]
Grainger Announcer
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- [00:30]
Travis Chapel
You're listening to the Travis Makes Money podcast presented by gohighlevel.com for a free 30 day trial of the best all in one digital marketing software tool on the planet. Just go to gohighlevel.com travis what's going on, everybody? Welcome back to the show. Have you ever felt lonely? You know, depressed, anxious that you're going to want to listen to the rest of this episode? And probably this will likely actually turn into a couple of episodes because the research here is pretty alarming, astounding, and it's long. To be honest with you, it took me a while for my layman brain to pour through some of this, some of this research for you guys, but we're gonna, we're gonna get to it. Welcome back to the show. This episode is just me, you, and the mic. And today we're talking about loneliness and social isolation. And there was what, what, what spawned this was basically a couple years ago when I rebranded the Build your network podcast to the Travis makes Friends podcast. We did a deep dive into loneliness and the epidemic that is involved around that these days. And that's where we're going to spend some of our time today is basically the Surgeon General put out an entire report about the loneliness epidemic. And that's how prevalent this was, that the actual U.S. surgeon General put out an entire health warning about the repercussions of loneliness. It's the whole reason for my show's existence and because we have never been more connected. You know, we, we're more connected than we've ever been. But the data shows that we're actually more lonely than we've ever been. In fact, it's gotten so bad that the US Surgeon General themselves released this health warning to us. And I wanted to share some of the alarming parts of this report because there are some pretty crazy things. Number one, loneliness and social isolation are a massive problem. People may lack social connection a variety of ways, though it's often illustrated in scientific research by measuring loneliness and social isol, both of these things together. Right? So social isolation and loneliness, they are related things, they're, they're grouped together, but they're not actually the same thing. And it's a very, very important distinction because the prescription that is given to solve loneliness, I think sometimes is incorrect because of the distinction between, between these two areas. Social, social isolation is objectively having few social relationships, social roles, group memberships, infrequent social interaction. And on the other hand, loneliness is a subjective internal state. It's a distressing experience that results from perceived isolation or unmet need between an individual's preferred and actual experience. That's insidious, it's subjective and it's perceived isolation. It's you, you, you. So, so this is how we get people who are surrounded by friends, surrounded by family, surrounded by those who care about them, seemingly love them, and then they still feel it's feeling lonely in a crowd of people. And that is the more insidious nature of the loneliness epidemic. Because that's not necessarily solved by just like going, enjoying and joining a new group. You know what I mean? That's not necessarily solved by just hanging out with your friends at the bar more. This is an internal, subjective, perceived isolation because it's unmet needs between individuals preferred and actual experience. So their expectations of what belonging feels like are not being met. And that is where I think the majority of people would probably raise their hand and say, that's what I'm confused by is that I feel like I have a lot of people in my life, but I still feel really lonely. I still feel anxious, still feel depressed. So big difference between those two things. And we're going to get into some of the, some of the reasons for that. Second, second thing that I noticed from this report is loneliness can affect your mental health. This is a little bit more obvious to me, but a systematic review of multiple longitudinal studies found that the odds of developing depression in adults is more than double among people who report feeling lonely often compared to those who rarely or never feel lonely. So it is very, it is the, you know, beginning stages of, of depression. It's two times as likely to suffer from depression when you start with loneliness. Furthermore, in, in other, in older adults, both social isolation and loneliness have been shown to independently increase the likelihood of depression or anxiety. Social isolation is arguably the strongest and most reliable predictor of suicidal ideation attempts and lethal suic adult behavior among samples varying in age, nationality and clinical severity. And this comes from a study called the Interpersonal Theory of Suicide. So depression, anxiety, suicide, all of these things are dramatically increased by loneliness, which to me makes at least some door, some, some, some degree of sense here. Next, loneliness can affect your bank account and the economy at large. Obviously. On this show, you know, we have Travis Makes Friends podcast where we talk about loneliness and isolation and we talk and then we have Travis podcast talks about making more money. Who knew that both of these things affect each other? Spoiler alert. I. I knew because of this research and because of the last nine years of my life putting effort into teaching people how to build better relationships and how to make more money. These two things are often intertwined and it's not something that we think about, but it does affect the economy at scale. So loneliness, excuse me, the lack of social connection can have significant economic costs to individuals, communities, and society at large. Isolation among older adults alone accounts for an estimated $6.7 billion in excess Medicare spending annually. Think about that. Almost $7 billion in excess Medicare spending due to loneliness and social isolation among older adults, largely due to increased hospital and nursing facility spending.
- [06:23]
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- [06:29]
Travis Chapel
Mom talk has just been blowing up.
- [06:31]
Podcast Guest or Co-host
Whitney and Jen are on Dancing with the Stars. Taylor is a bachelorette. Out loud is crazy. Like that is huge.
- [06:37]
Travis Chapel
But all the cool opportunities could pull us apart.
- [06:39]
Podcast Guest or Co-host
It's causing issues in everyone's marriage.
- [06:41]
Roku Advertiser
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- [06:44]
Podcast Guest or Co-host
It's chaos.
- [06:46]
Hulu Advertiser
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- [06:52]
Travis Chapel
Terms apply beyond direct healthcare spending. Loneliness and isolation are associated with lower academic achievement and worse performance at work. So it affects every area of your life. Your ability to earn income, your ability to perform at work, your ability to perform in school. In the US Stress related absenteeism attributed to loneliness costs employers an estimated $154 billion annually. Stress related absenteeism attributed to loneliness costs employers an estimated $154 billion annually. The impact is so much greater than we assume that it is. The impact of social connection not only affects individuals, but also the communities that they live in. Social connection is an important social determinant of health and more broadly, of community well being, including, but not limited to population health, community resilience when natural hazards strike, community safety, economic prosperity, and representative government. All of this stems back to this idea of loneliness, which again, a lot of this stuff is blowing my mind. Like the, the very first one, like I said to me, that makes sense. Like, of course loneliness affects mental health. And like all those stats to me when I read them is like, it's still mind blowing, but it also, it's like, okay, I can see the. I can see the breadcrumb trail. You know, I can see how this, how this would equal that. When you start thinking about, oh, bank accounts, economy at scale, you think about local communities, people's ability to have resilience. When natural hazards strike economic prosperity, it's costing businesses billions of dollars annually. I mean, this is a. I mean, billions of dollars is not even a great way to say it. $154 billion. Like we're talking, you know, into the hundreds of billions of dollars annually due to loneliness. And then this one was probably the most surprising to me out of all of these data points. And that is, loneliness can affect your physical health. The lack of social connection poses a significant risk for individual health and longevity. Loneliness and social isolation increase the risk for premature death by 26 and 29%, respectively. Think about that. Increase the risk for premature death by 26 and 29%. So 26% loneliness, 29% social isolation. More broadly, lacking social connection can increase the risk for premature death as much as smoking up to 15 cigarettes every single day. In addition, poor or insufficient social connection is associated with increased risk of disease, including a 29% increased risk of heart disease and a 32% increased risk of stroke from loneliness. Heart disease and strokes increased by loneliness by, by 30%. I mean, that's, that's not a small number. Furthermore, it's associated with increase for anxiety, depression, and dementia, which we sort of already talked about, not dementia. Dementia is a new one here. Additionally, the lack of social connection may increase susceptibility to viruses and respiratory illness. A 2022 study found that when people were asked how close they felt to Others emotionally, only 39% of adults in the US said that they felt very connected to others. So you just heard all of these terrible negative repercussions of what it looks like for society at large when are more lonely and socially isolated. And then when you compare that to the fact that only 39% of adults in the US said that they felt very connected to others. That's why this is a widespread epidemic. This implies that 61% of adults in the US do not feel very connected to others, which is unprecedented. That has not happened before. An important indicator of this declining social connection is an increase in the proportion of Americans experiencing loneliness. Recent surveys have found that Approximately half of us, half of us adults, 50% half of us adults report experiencing loneliness with some of the highest rates among young adults. These estimates and multiple other studies indicate that loneliness and isolation are more widespread than many of the other major health issues of our day, including smoking, only 12.5% of US adults, diabetes 14.7% of adults and obesity 41.9% of adults. And with comparable levels of risk to health and premature death. Despite such high prevalence, less than 20% of individuals who often are always feel lonely or isolated recognize it as a major problem. This, this is the reason why I talk about this on the show as much as I possibly can because it's a matter of awareness. Less than 20% of individuals who often are always feel lonely are isolated or isolated recognize it as a major problem. That by itself is a major problem. The fact that this is leading to so many issues and increased causes of mortality to a significant degree and more so than the majority of the other major things that we're all on the lookout for, right? Like diabetes and, and obesity and smoking and heart disease. Like we're all hyper aware of so many of these other things. Yet loneliness, the thing that actually increases our odds of getting all of those things is not talked about in less than 20% of the individuals. And this is the, this is the part of the group, this is not the part of the group that feels like sometimes I feel lonely. This is the worst part of this group, meaning that these are individuals who often are always feel lone or isolated. Less than 20% of those people recognize it as a major problem. Over four decades of research has produced robust evidence that lacking social connection and in particular scoring high on measures of social isolation is associated with a significantly increased risk for early death from all causes. It is a significant increased risk of all cause mortality from being lonely. Guys, this is why this is such an important topic to talk about and something to make people more aware of. More recent estimates based on Synthesizing data across 148 studies. 148 studies. It's, it's pretty, pretty eye opening data here with an average of 7 and a half years of follow up suggests that social connection increases the odds of survival by 50%. 5. 0. 50%. This is synthesizing data across 148 studies. With an average of 7 1/2 years of follow up. Social connection increases the odds of of survival by 50. Indeed, the effects of social connection, isolation and loneliness on mortality are comparable and in some cases greater than those of many other risk factors including lifestyle factors like smoking, alcohol consumption, physical inactivity, traditional clinical risks, risk factors like high blood pressure, body mass index, Cholesterol levels and environmental factors like air pollution, and clinical intervention interventions like the flu vaccine or high blood pressure medication or rehabilitation. I mean, it's, it's, it's sometimes easy to go with the anecdotal evidence and just talk about the fact that people feel lonely or talk about the idea that there's, that this is an issue. But then when you see the data, it's impossible to argue that this is something that we should not have full attention on. And then the, the last kind of takeaway here for, for me was that it's not getting any better, it's actually getting worse. For example, objective measures of social exposure obtained from 2003-20 that social isolation measured by the average time spent alone increased from 2003 to 2019. So 2003 it was 285 minutes a day or 142 hours a month to 2019, 309 minutes a day or 154 hours a month. And then continued to increase in 2020. For obvious reasons, 2020 was kind of a socially isolating type of a year which jumped up to, from, from 309 minutes a day to 333 minutes a day or 166 hours a month, which an increase of 24 hours per month spent alone in that 17 year time frame. 24 hours per month spent alone in just a 17 year period. At the same time, social participation across several types of relationships has steadily declined. For instance, the amount of time respondents engaged with friends socially in person decreased from 2003 to 2020 from 60 minutes a day, 30 hours a month to 20 minutes a day or 10 hours a month, 30 month to 10 hours a month. That's a what, 766 and change percent decrease in the volume of time that people engage with their friends socially in person represents a decrease of 20 hours per month spent engaging with friends. This decline is starkest for young people ages 15 to 24. For this age group, time spent in person with friends has reduced by nearly 70% over almost two decades, 70% over almost two decades, from roughly 150 minutes per day in 2003 to 40 minutes per day in 2020. And obviously, you know, Covid accelerated these trends in declining social participation in a very, very short period of time and unfortunately normalized it. Right. So because we had to adjust because of COVID you know, people got used to the idea of doing their school online. People got used to the idea of not going into the office and not spending time with people in person. The number of close friendships declined over several decades. Among people not reporting loneliness or social isolation, nearly 90% have three or more confidants. So this is people who are not reporting loneliness or social isolation. This is part of the 50% that would not be experiencing these things. Nearly 90% of those people have three or more confidants, yet almost half eczema
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- [16:59]
Ebglis Medical Information Speaker
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- [17:32]
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- [17:39]
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Travis Chapel
See website for details of Americans reported having three or fewer close friends. Only about a quarter reported the same in 1990, so it has doubled since 1990. Social connection continued to decline during the COVID 19 pandemic, with one study finding a 16% decrease in network size from June 19 to June 2020. Among participants, there is there is a There is an epidemic of loneliness going on right now, guys. And I read all this not to, not to make you be fearful or to put you in a negative state, but simply just to bring awareness to the, to the matter that this is a real problem for a of people and the only way out of it is to bring more awareness to this idea. Because there's so many people who don't understand, first of all whether or not they actually are feeling lonely or, or if they're actually, or, or they're just socially isolated. Where we would. Identifying which of those two is affecting you is really helpful. But then also, but then also just having an awareness of all of the things that, all of the negative repercussions that happen because we tend to downplay it, right? We, we think about, you know, all the things that affect our health over a long period of time and we initially go to, well, drinking alco, go to smoking and we go to some of these other things. But we see in these studies that those things actually have less of an impact on your longevity and your health and your well being than being socially connected does. So it's smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day, drinking six alcoholic drinks daily. Physical inactivity, obesity, air pollution, all of those things have less of an effect on your, on your health long term than lacking social connection does to a significant degree. Like something like obesity, we would think, you know, well, obesity increases, you know, your, your risk of getting all these other things. And that is true. Yet there are some people who, who in an effort to stay in the best shape of their life because they think this is the thing that's going to help them have health and longevity for a long period of time, they give up their social connection in order to attain some of these other goals. When these other goals are so much less valuable when it comes to your longevity than lacking social does so and air pollution like obesity looks like it is about four times, five times worse to have to lack social connection than it is to be obese in terms of your ability to live a long and healthy life. You know, the, the data is, the data is inarguable and frankly a little bit, a little bit scary. And like I said, I hope, I hope I'm not being the Debbie Downer of the day, but I do, I do believe that the only way to, to, you know, get out of these things is to be aware of it and to talk about it and, and then to build a plan to make sure that you're going to be in the 50% of Americans who aren't feeling like this on a daily basis. So I know this was somewhat of a nihilistic episode, but I wanted to start here to give you a heads up that this is a real problem. And if you're experiencing loneliness or social isolation, not only are you not alone, but it's time to take it seriously. It's time to, to to figure out a path forward here. And it's probably the number one highest leverage activity that you can do to impact your health and longevity over a long period of time is to focus on fixing the inner feelings of loneliness if you are currently experiencing them. So that's what we're gonna start doing on a couple episodes of the show. This one was the first one. Just to start it off to make you aware that this is something that is happening. And then also, if you're interested in connecting with me, I'm gonna open up my calendar for the first time in a while. You can go to travischapel.com chat. Just have a 15 minute chat with me and I'd love to, love to get to know you a little bit better and you know, see how we can help tackle this problem together. So thanks for tuning into this episode. We'll catch you guys on the next one where we'll talk about this a little more. We're going to focus on this for the next few days here. So appreciate you hanging out with me and we'll. We'll talk in the next episode. See you. See you there.
- [22:01]
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