Scientists: Eight hours of solitude in some people is comparable in effect to fasting

Eight hours of solitude in some people is comparable in effect to an eight-hour fast. As scientists from the Universities of Vienna and Cambridge found out, the most often affected by the absence of the company are people who live alone or who especially enjoy social interaction.

“In a lab study, we found a striking similarity between social isolation and starvation,” Austrian psychologists Ana Stijovic and Paul Forbes told Science Alert. Both conditions cause decreased energy and increased fatigue. This is surprising, given that food deprivation literally makes us lose energy, while social isolation does not.

For a laboratory test, the authors invited 30 female volunteers. They were examined for three days for 8 hours each. On the first day they were left without social contact, on the second without food, on the third without both. In parallel, the participants talked about their level of stress, mood and fatigue, they also measured their heart rate and saliva levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

In another, already field experiment, 87 people living in Austria, Italy and Germany took part; it was held in the spring of 2020 during the period of self-isolation due to COVID-19. Participants were alone for at least 8 hours, and then had to answer questions in a mobile application – questions were similar to those asked by women in a laboratory test.

Both phases showed that insulation can indeed deplete energy reserves. According to the test with food and loneliness, the authors concluded that those who lived alone and were more sociable by nature suffered the most. Their overall energy level dropped markedly on days when they didn’t interact with anyone, compared to periods when they did have little interaction.