Chronic Loneliness Linked to Early Death

[rainbowtokyo]

Finally, a scientific study showing that lonely people often suffer premature death. More good cheer for those gaijin who are living the shoebox life in Japan. If you are more lonely in Japan than you were at 'home', maybe it is time to consider the unthinkable.

Mom and Pop are waiting for you.......get on that plane and get back home, it'd do you good.


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Feb 24th 2011 | WASHINGTON, DC | from the print edition of the Economist
Lonely people, it seems, are at greater risk than the gregarious of developing illnesses associated with chronic inflammation, such as heart disease and certain cancers. According to a paper published last year in the Public Library of Science, Medicine, the effect on mortality of loneliness is comparable with that of smoking and drinking. It examined, and combined the results of, 148 previous studies that followed some 300,000 individuals for an average period of 7.5 years each, and controlled for factors such as age and pre-existing illness. It concluded that, over such a period, a gregarious person has a 50% better chance of surviving than a lonely one.

Steven Cole of the University of California, Los Angeles, thinks he may know why this is so. He told the AAAS meeting in Washington, DC, about his work studying the expression of genes in lonely people. Dr Cole harvested samples of white blood cells from both lonely and gregarious people. He then analysed the activity of their genes, as measured by the production of a substance called messenger RNA. This molecule carries instructions from the genes telling a cell which proteins to make. The level of messenger RNA from most genes was the same in both types of people. There were several dozen genes, however, that were less active in the lonely, and several dozen others that were more active. Moreover, both the less active and the more active gene types came from a small number of functional groups.

Broadly speaking, the genes less active in the lonely were those involved in staving off viral infections. Those that were more active were involved in protecting against bacteria. Dr Cole suspects this could help explain not only why the lonely are iller, but how, in evolutionary terms, this odd state of affairs has come about. For inflammation is an antibacterial response.

The crucial bit of the puzzle is that viruses have to be caught from another infected individual and they are usually species-specific. Bacteria, in contrast, often just lurk in the environment (like tetanus), and may thrive on many hosts (as does bubonic plague, for example). The gregarious are therefore at greater risk than the lonely of catching viruses, and Dr Cole thus suggests that past evolution has created a mechanism (the details of which remain unclear) which causes white cells to respond appropriately. Conversely, the lonely are better off ramping up their protection against bacterial infection, which is a bigger relative risk to them.

What Dr Cole seems to have revealed, then, is a mechanism by which the environment (in this case the social environment) reaches inside a person’s body and tweaks its genome so that it responds appropriately. It is not that the lonely and the gregarious are genetically different from each other. Rather, their genes are regulated differently, according to how sociable an individual is. Dr Cole thinks this regulation is part of a wider mechanism that tunes individuals to the circumstances they find themselves in. Where it goes wrong is when loneliness becomes chronic, and the inflammatory response becomes chronic at the same time.

Before civilisation intervened, such chronic loneliness would have been so rare (because isolated individuals are so vulnerable to predation) that evolution would have ignored it. Now, paradoxically, the large population that civilisation makes possible means loneliness is commonplace―and with it consequences that natural selection, which is blind to the future, has not yet had time to deal with.

[ozzijp]

Finally, a scientific study showing that lonely people often suffer premature death. More good cheer for those gaijin who are living the shoebox life in Japan. If you are more lonely in Japan than you were at 'home', maybe it is time to consider the unthinkable.

Mom and Pop are waiting for you.......get on that plane and get back home, it'd do you good.

Thanks for the cheer. Last time I looked, the census indicated that any "lonely" gaijin were considerably less lonely than they were in their home countries (males only surprisingly). Who really believes those numbers, I ask you?

[well_bicyclically]

Finally, a scientific study showing that lonely people often suffer premature death. More good cheer for those gaijin who are living the shoebox life in Japan. If you are more lonely in Japan than you were at 'home', maybe it is time to consider the unthinkable.

Mom and Pop are waiting for you.......get on that plane and get back home, it'd do you good......

what are you blabbering about now??? In all my years in Japan, I have never met, never heard of any gaijin living what you call "a shoebox life"! Lonely?? In this country?? Only if you go out of your way to avoid people! Shhhsh!

[YokohamaTommy]

[Effected After]

what are you blabbering about now??? In all my years in Japan, I have never met, never heard of any gaijin living what you call "a shoebox life"! Lonely?? In this country?? Only if you go out of your way to avoid people! Shhhsh!

By definition, there could be scores of them and you wouldn't have met them.

[Call_It_Like_Eye_See_It]

By definition, there could be scores of them and you wouldn't have met them.

'Tis true. 30,000+ suicides in Japan over for the past 12 years of so and I haven't met any of them....

[Seattlegirl]

"Alone" and "lonely" are two separate terms. You can't ever really be alone in Japan but you can sure as hell be lonely.

[well_bicyclically]

'Tis true. 30,000+ suicides in Japan over for the past 12 years of so and I haven't met any of them....

OP is projecting his own lonely life onto what he assumes is the same life here, but in a smaller residence. I doubt any foreigners are included in that 30,000 ... out of national pride...

[takun]

It examined, and combined the results of, 148 previous studies that followed some 300,000 individuals for an average period of 7.5 years each, and controlled for factors such as age and pre-existing illness. It concluded that, over such a period, a gregarious person has a 50% better chance of surviving than a lonely one.

50 percent better chance of survival over an average period of 7.5 years seems way too high. If we are generous and say that 100% of gregarious people survived that period, that means that at best 66% of lonely people will survive, or am I misreading this?

[Hijinx]

"Alone" and "lonely" are two separate terms. You can't ever really be alone in Japan but you can sure as hell be lonely.

So are you lonely if you want to be left alone all the time?

[ozzijp]

Mom and Pop are waiting for you.......get on that plane and get back home, it'd do you good.

This is seriously one of your more ridiculous posts. You need to be on the Japanese language boards with this. Foreigners, lonely in Japan? Have you ever lived here? I think I speak for most people when I say this, we have very little personal time due to the constant need to "let go" those friendly folk wanting to friend us up.

I am going to have to formally ground you from making any silly posts for the next 2 weeks. On the upside, I have sharpened your crayons and put a lot of paper in your room.

[rainbowtokyo]

This is seriously one of your more ridiculous posts. .

A scientific study showing a link between chronic loneliness and poor health. It's a first as far as I know. It is so ridiculous they printed it in a respected international journal. It's also done the rounds in Lancet and JAMA.

Have you ever lived here? .

Yes.

I speak for most people when I say this, we have very little personal time

Some people here on GP, despite being busy with overwhelming work and social commitments, still manage to post several times everyday. They must either be very bored or very lonely. Or maybe, like KB, they are extremely kind and want to help their fellow gaijin in Japan. Of course I'm delighted to know you aren't lonely Ozzijp You seem to have coped well with recent events in your personal life. Good on you. Hope la famiglia is doing ok.

the constant need to "let go" those friendly folk wanting to friend us up. .

Cynical people would call these 'friends' English Bandits but I agree with you - they are harmless enough and make for amusing company. On my part, I am almost always never lonely in Japan.

[well_bicyclically]

...Some people here on GP, despite being busy with overwhelming work and social commitments, still manage to post several times everyday. They must either be very bored or very lonely.....

...or maybe they are here seeking re-afirmation that they made the right decision to leave their homelands as those that stayed (like you!) are absolute nut jobs without so much as a clue to what earning a living and making a live for oneself abroad is really like.

[rainbowtokyo]

.. without so much as a clue to what earning a living and making a live for oneself abroad is really like.

If you mean I don't have a clue about the English entertainment business, then you are entirely right. Count me out pal. I'm not into deceiving people that I'm teaching them English. That's for people like you.

[twelvedown]

Are you the guy on here a few weeks ago asking what club to join to make friends?
Oh yeah... that was you.. how's that going?

[rainbowtokyo]

Are you the guy on here a few weeks ago asking what club to join to make friends? Oh yeah... that was you.. how's that going?

Boo Hoo, I'm so upset. Not.

1. I don't go to Clubs to make friends
2. The Press Club is a place to network with connected people, not a place to get wasted while watching football and chanting oi oi oi.
3. You and the ever-bitter WB don't get it - that's why you will be 'teaching' Engrish for a long time yet.

[kurogane]

Aside from that nice reverse statistical analysis by Takun above, and even allowing for Rainboy's usual schadenfreude laden sanctimonious sniping, just because he is almost always wrong-hearted doesn't mean he is wrong here.

I would be very surprised that being chronically lonely doesn't adversely affect your longevity.

I wonder if that deported fake Canadian journalist RT was championing a while ago felt lonely in his Gulag cell at Narita?

At least we can hold a hope it might work in his case................

[YokohamaTommy]

Boo Hoo, I'm so upset. Not.

1. I don't go to Clubs to make friends
2. The Press Club is a place to network with connected people, not a place to get wasted while watching football and chanting oi oi oi.

Translation:

"M'yes...INDEED!"



"Balderdash I say!" Uncouth ruffians! The lot of you!" ~Lord Alfred T. Rainbow IV esq.

[oxymoron]

Whenever I'm lonely, I just look in the mirror and there is my bestest friend. All happy again and any thoughts of committing sudoku are rinsed away.

[well_bicyclically]

Boo Hoo, I'm so upset. .......
3. You and the ever-bitter WB don't get it - that's why you will be 'teaching' Engrish for a long time yet.

You are many light of the doctors, company presidents, presidents-in-waiting, et al, that I work with. All of whom are pretty fascinating, if you'd ask me.

You should take a lesson! Scads for you to learn!



Speaking of deceiving..... How did that real estate investment inf Beverley Hills work out??? Must hav e a bargain if they could afford the extra vowel!!

[well_bicyclically]

Whenever I'm lonely, I just look in the mirror and there is my bestest friend. All happy again and any thoughts of committing sudoku are rinsed away.

That would not work with RT..... Glass and mirrors are banned in the institute, you see!

[ozzijp]

A scientific study showing a link between chronic loneliness and poor health. It's a first as far as I know. It is so ridiculous they printed it in a respected international journal.

I can't be bothered looking but I would find it very surprising if this was the first mention of something like this ever.

It's also done the rounds in Lancet and JAMA.

Right now it is doing the rounds of LMFLOA.

You seem to have coped well with recent events in your personal life. Good on you. Hope la famiglia is doing ok.

Please extrapolate.

I am almost always never lonely in Japan.

Well, when you are...Originally Posted by rainbowtokyo
Mom and Pop are waiting for you.......get on that plane and get back home, it'd do you good.

[rainbowtokyo]

I can't be bothered looking but I would find it very surprising if this was the first mention of something like this ever.
Right now it is doing the rounds of LMFLOA.

I thought, silly me, you had a medical background. Never mind. Lancet, for you, might mean a pin prick. And JAMA might mean what you and your wife did to eachother. Never mind that these are among the developed world's most respected medical journals.

Anyhow, good luck old chum. Hope your family is as insouciant as you appear to be. Scarcely a year ago you spoke of your daughter's birthday and wanting to to give her a suitable present. I really respected you for that at the time.

Life goes on. Good luck to you and your ex and daughter. Hope they are coping as well as you seem to be.

[kurogane]

You do often give the impression that you are howling at the abyss, RT.

And your latest round of presumptuously sanctimonious psychogymnastic projections do come across exactly like that to a lot of us.

I, however, prefer to ridicule and revile you as the finger wagging, brain-challenged douchey twott you are, not for the universal crime of being lonely.

What about trying some of the events at international exchange centres and such???

Surely even a retard like you speaks some Japanese?

Or maybe you could start a Justice for Gulag Gaijins with that Canadian pseudo-journalist you were championing back when he got his fat dumb arss kicked out for being, well, just that???

[Deathblob]

I heard he's back in Japan. But I heard that on GP, so ... Gomen Nasai!!!!!!!!!!

[kurogane]

I heard he's back in Japan. But I heard that on GP, so ... Gomen Nasai!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, his dog missed him so much he was crying himself to sleep every night, or so they tell me.

I hope he seriously considers the gravity of his slanderous rampage, and thinks about committing sudoku.

It might help him not be so friggin' stoopid in the future.

[rainbowtokyo]

Surely even a retard like you speaks some Japanese?

Oh dear, I'm waving my finger again. Pure and simple, you are a bully Kuro. I always recoil when 'educated' people use the word 'retard' as frequently as you do. Anyone else would be banned for it. But we all know how cosy you are with GP's moderators. It's no surprise that you have spent much of your life teaching 'Engrish' when you should be out there flipping burgers with the rest of the right-wing charisma men. But then again you are past 50 and McDonalds only employs young people. Feeling hurt or even just a little testy? Ask the mods to delete this and I am sure they will happily comply. Ooooh you are a powerful little man around here.

Or maybe you could start a Justice for Gulag Gaijins with that Canadian pseudo-journalist you were championing back when he got his fat dumb arss kicked out for being, well, just that???

If he was the nasty criminal that everyone makes him out to be, he would surely have been charged in court. But they let him go after shaking him down and scaring him. I actually feel sorry for the man and am delighted he managed to get back HOME to his missus and pets. But then again, I have a soft spot for underdogs. I even stood up for Debito once or twice. Now that should raise some hackles here.

Happy to receive your slings and arrows folks.......more hits = more money for GP's owners. They need all the cash your hits can generate.

[caramellocap]

Funny.... you claim to be an Aussie but as one I can tell you no Aussie I know would advise people to go back home to 'Mom and Pop'. We just don't say/write that. You sound like a Pom trying to sound like an Aussie using American spelling.

Very strange. I remember at some stage you were accusing me of being another poster. I looked him up and found out he was being stalked by a Pom who masqueraded under different aliases and that poster reminds me of the way you write.

Kurogane - I told ya before and I will tell you again, RT is an old stalker of yours and other people. He's been banned umpteen times and always comes back under many different names and many different claims. The latest is he goes on biz trips to China but I think the nearest he's been to China was to the Chinese takeaway in some provincial UK backwater to get lemon chicken or whatever they serve up.

Ignore, ignore, ignore.

[kurogane]

Kurogane - I told ya before and I will tell you again, RT is an old stalker of yours and other people. .

Didya!!???????????

I must have had a senior memory moment...............


Soooooooooooo, how ah ya?????

And thanks, btw.

[caramellocap]

Good thanks! Out of Engrish teaching and into business, tied the knot last yr. Don't laugh - a J girl w/Korean ancestry but intelligent and while identifying more as a Korean, is savvy enough to know what's wrong with the ancestral land.

Great to see you're still around, did ya move back to Japan or are you in Canada? Either way, good to hear from you, hope Jacque s is still posting as well.