Loneliness is rising across all age groups, driven by shifts in work, technology, culture and social life that are weakening everyday human connection.
Loneliness, once thought to be the province of the elderly, seems to have become a widespread epidemic. A year ago, I quit my job in Australia and moved to Belgium with my boyfriend. What followed was the loneliest year of my life.
Away from my family and friends, and my partner occupied with his PhD research, I struggled with a level of isolation I hadn’t experienced before. A new country and a new language were part of my problem but then I found, with almost anyone I spoke to, there was an immediate recognition of what I was feeling. Many of my friends were expats, but expat or local, it seemed loneliness was widespread and had become a defining feature of our modern world.
In the United Kingdom, a Minister for Loneliness has been appointed, and in Japan, where there are more aged people than anywhere else in the world, the crisis is so severe that some elderly people have committed petty crimes to go to prison for company.
In Australia, one in three adults report regularly feeling lonely and 38 per cent of 18- to 24- year-olds report feeling lonely often or always. In the United States, around one in five adults feel lonely daily, and roughly half experience loneliness occasionally.
We now know that loneliness has physical consequences. In 2023, the US Surgeon General’s Advisory declared loneliness a public health epidemic, with mortality impacts comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. The quality of a person’s relationships is the strongest predictor of health, happiness and longevity. Social connection protects the body; loneliness slowly erodes it.
Why has loneliness become so pervasive in our modern world; where has this epidemic come from?
The western world has pushed independence as a marker of success. There is pressure to grow up, make a life for yourself, stand on your own two feet. The irony of striving to be so independent is that in the end young and old alike need interdependence to feel useful, needed and seen.
More men are living alone, not in committed relationships, and not having children. Even couples are choosing to remain child free, so the social engagement and purpose that occurs naturally when rearing young children isn’t there for these people.
Since the 1960s, membership in community organisations and social clubs has fallen by more than half in English speaking countries. Church attendance has fallen away. Spaces that enable social interaction are harder to find, and people when outdoors often engage more with their phones than with passers-by. Particularly post-Covid.
Work itself is breeding isolation and loneliness. Working from home may be convenient and well suited to individual needs, but it erodes the casual interactions the workplace provides. At the same time, work increasingly follows people home through phones and laptops, leaving less time for their relationships.
Additionally, our consumption of unhealthy food and use of addictive screen time is contributing to a decline in physical and mental health. Add to this the growing wealth divide, which has pushed many households into dual incomes or multiple jobs, and it becomes easier to understand a pervasive inertia gripping so many people. Loneliness takes root when staying financially afloat means there is simply less time, opportunity and energy available for connection.
When Covid hit, I started drifting from my friends because we couldn’t see each other. Watching people online filled that social void. I still follow people I started watching back then because I enjoy their content, but it is a strange dynamic where I know intimate details about their lives, but they have no idea I exist.
The problem with parasocial relationships is that they require nothing from you, no vulnerability, effort, or risk of rejection, and offer easy, constant comfort. Over time, that can make real-world connection which is fraught with friction feel harder by comparison.
Pornhub is the ninth most frequently visited website worldwide. While the most cited motivation for pornography use is sexual stimulation, studies show it is also often used for stress reduction and emotional distraction or suppression. While humans are biologically driven to seek sex, pornography can remove the relational aspects of sexual experience and provide a very short-term fix.
Politically, it is increasingly obvious how divided we have become. In today’s climate, political affiliations can be enough to have you dismissed from conversation immediately. Disagreement has become so charged that simply expressing an opinion can feel socially risky.
Algorithms feed us what we’re likely to engage with, creating echo chambers without us realising. We become used to a low-friction virtual world where everything aligns with our existing views. When real conversations don’t match that experience, we struggle to navigate confrontation, frustration, or disagreement. Rather than taking interest in a difference of opinion, difference becomes viewed as a threat. When people feel unable to speak openly, we cannot reach understanding and build anything in common.
I believe most people want the same things from life – economic security, good health, access to care, belonging, safety, fairness, and freedom. The confusion and disagreement lie in how to achieve these goals. Recognising our common interests should make it easier to relate to those we strongly disagree with or at least leave space for connection. For if we feel it’s me against the world, we deepen division and risk isolation. The result then is a society of individuals living parallel lives, which are, by nature, lonely.
Writers and thinkers from Eleanor Roosvelt to Einstein and Dostoyevsky have argued that what people need most is a sense of shared meaning, a purpose, or belief in a story that helps us understand why our lives matter. In a world shaped by political tension, environmental decline, increasing social division, smart phones and now AI, it can be easy to feel that nothing really matters.
Finding purpose takes work; it is not something you stumble across. It is built by showing up, through connection, and choosing to engage with the world even when it feels easier not to. Through connection we learn we are needed and we matter.
Emily Buck
Emily Buck is a writer and former environmental consultant from Australia, currently living in Belgium. She is developing a documentary series examining the far-reaching consequences of insect decline and has a broader interest in how societal and environmental changes shape human experience.