Feeling lonely around a lot of people isnt a contradiction in terms. Of has been living in hamburg for 6 months is a biologist who moved here for work now all he needs is a new circle of friends. Coming i come from a small town with 20000 residents a big city has lots of people but you can feel lost. Or you see other people since you dont know them you still feel lonely so maybe even lonelier because there are so many people. Advised me that ive never been the kind of guy to go into a bar and chat to people. Maybe as a student in a student pub but otherwise ive never done that its just not my thing but its. His family lives far away in southern germany because 20200 before taking the job and hung work leaving his University Friends behind. Openly admitting youre lonely is still a social taboo yet one in every 10 people are thought to be affected by it with grave consequences. Studies show that chronic loneliness can make people ill physically as well as mentally. Get doctors and scientists are only beginning to understand why that is. Is loneliness a personal problem or a serious social issue. Like christiane many people feel lonely and isolated after a move. Germanys federal Statistical Office says each year 6 percent of the population moves home christiane works on his own out in the field with no colleagues for companionship a lot of fun at 1st i spent many nights sitting at home on the sofa but because i didnt know where to go to meet people mystic often couldnt summon the energy to find out finish the noida. Christiane says apartment is located in southern home bored in the enix of a Single Family home. Originally he planned to move in with his long term girlfriend but then they broke up. I think im someone who doesnt much like being alone this but im trying to enjoy the single life and learning to deal with it even though its quite an adjustment and not so easy in this office. At 1st i just feel so lonely and socially isolated as i live off the beaten path of us. Sam a bit depressed because i just miss people human contact and you conduct. But how can you find new friends its not easy to meet other singles in this neighborhood which is mainly home to families. But Single Person households are increasingly common in europe. In germany 41 percent of people live alone. In sweden its a huge 51 percent while in portugal in slovakia its just 22 percent. Christiane decided to take action after finding out about a friendship app called 25 friends registered users can meet up at gatherings or activities with a limited number of participants christiane quickly created a profile providing his name date of birth and a photo now he was ready to meet other users the bigger the city the more invitations there are to join in Group Activities they didnt these days on line dating is commonplace so i thought why not i mean its worth a try. For me itll probably be perfect im on the go a lot so i can get to know people in the city on the way of all kinds and. At the whole university in the western german city of. Researchers investigate the effects of loneliness on the human psyche. Mike alumina as a psychologist in her research she differentiates between being alone social isolation and loneliness. She says im quite important to realize that loneliness isnt the same as being alone we understand loneliness to be the subjective feeling that the social contacts or relationships you have arent enough that you have fewer than youd like all maybe the relationships arent as good as youd like people suffer from that it hurts as much as physical pain. Some people need a lot of social contacts others feel well connected with just 2 friends. But being a lonely for a long time changes a person and possibly others to get studio in the lead in their own studies which suggests that loneliness is contagious one of the effects of loneliness is that you withdraw from others is all simply become a somewhat more unpleasant person. The size that means relationships suffer when a person is lonely and in the long run your partner can start to feel lonely too i know some of. The causes of loneliness are as diverse as the people themselves however there identifiable risk factors primarily Health Problems or major life changes like a separation a move or unemployment or Mental Health issues like depression. But what about being poor. Sociologist sebastian link is the coauthor of a study which examines how poverty influences social relationships. Then on mood when we talk about poverty we need to be conscious that poverty is a phenomenon thats accompanied by social withdrawal and a sense of shame that charm good food im here and of course that also makes the poor less miserable. Couldnt see it. In germany anyone who earns less than 60 percent of the average net income so less than 1100. 00 euros per month is said to be poor. Link study shows that poverty makes it hard to build and maintain social relationships poor people dont fully participate in society. Today is a must and link is visiting a neighborhood project in berlins courts back district. He greets the organizers. Others in the back and. Social workers Carla Miranda and tim are organized neighborhood meetings along with 3 cooking courses art classes and yoga sessions. They lend a sympathetic ear to the local problems they dont match up on the forget if i know i dont have much money where can i meet new people if i cant go to restaurants all the cinema thats hard to see against needless here is very low threshold that i just come in and theres something for me there are people who greet me and want me to stay. And most of whats on offer here is free. Cost and also. The boston link study shows that after 2 years of living in poverty people are less likely to meet with friends. Lets zoom in on the allstar the longer people live in poverty the more the social fabric changes. For instance we can see that when people have been poor for a longer period of time there are fewer contacts who are rich in resources in their close social network. And thats that. Cooking with friends is a free weekly event today over 30 local residents are taking part. In. Student and single mom jennifer hope no feels shes in good company here. But they dont think its really a question of money i dont get any student grants or any other Financial Aid from the state i have to and the money myself and with 2 children its not that easy to meet people in todays or anything like that. And here i can come into contact with all kinds of people and bring much of it along oh thats a huge help could then take us as i think the impact of. Creating meeting places and letting everyone participate fully in society are important for combating social isolation and loneliness. The swiss town of talk isnt one of the worlds richest countries but even prosperity cant always keep loneliness at bay. My own woman tyler is 77 years old and lives alone. Among esteemed that youre sad and it makes you tired. Thank you think what do i do now. And withdraw a little bit i need to cut she says that its just awful to feel so lonely and so and someone just. Minus a partner died 2 years ago. They lived together for 21 years and she nursed him right to the end. After his death my own health began to decline as much ive tried but you just have to go on. And there are days that go really well where youre happy. So you cant understand when suddenly the sadness hits you. When youre so alone and theres no one around to talk to and its not easy but. Denis and i sign for hot. Ron paul and these sometimes you dont want to go out anymore youre just blocked somehow they have data continually. And somehow to my loneliness in old age is particularly challenging i think because especially among the very elderly loneliness has very specific causes that are almost impossible to combat for example Impaired Health thats simply age related or the loss of a close relative. Those cant be easily replaced you can just tell someone and find a new spouse and the reality and. Mine are used to be well connected in her neighborhood she also met her former partner here. Just in the afternoon but the older people went away and younger ones came for 4 and people used to have time for a chat but that happens less these days is this i mean theyre. The ones provincial town of talk is now a booming Business Location that attracts expats from all around the world. So its on a fast didnt he was born into spells out the consequences. Thank you god even soon its evident how many single households we have how many expats who are here for a few months or years and then disappear. People have less and less contact with one another so the family unit is in decline and fall off if we keep Building Family homes which are then occupied by singles. Its problematic when we see neighborhoods going to pieces and the resulting lack of solidarity. Those on a fast bend is cofounder of the Kiss Foundation short for keep it small and simple since 2016 its team has been establishing new Neighborhood Networks and soup to prevent social isolation only day our idea is to strengthen social cohesion to quickly i say quickly in quotation marks to quickly get people connected so that they can support one another in growing that is the basically they take responsibility on their own time strength and solidarity thats whats most important this week so. This helps neighbors help one another with car rides shopping or going out on walks no money changes hands instead the networks 200 members document the time spent its then credited to their time account. So they can seek help in return or save up credit for later. The biggest demand is for conversation 1960 hours were booked last year along. Help with everyday activities was next but 1917 hours. Has changed my as life. Through it she meant you did fisher whos been paying my of regular visits for a year now. Thank you god. Thats great. That we can go out. And do this if you would it is a lawyer who lives nearby today shes helping my attend her garden something she cant do want to her own. Regular interaction has been shown to increase peoples Life Satisfaction kiss member unit fisher profits to. Us modestly my you months that i 1st time someone from kiss is always on hand they introduce the people and see if theyre a good match. I hope that we would get along. But when i saw her i knew right away that she was right for me. And so we found one another. Shes a wonderful woman who always helps me. Even. Knowing that their help or is being compensated with a time credit makes it easier for some to accept assistance if. They dont feel like theyre accepting charity. This kid and gives both of us a sense of security i can go away on holiday knowing someones looking after my garden someone who knows about gardening as you can see. And in turn she knows that if somethings up she can call me on the roof and say that is so reassuring isnt it today you did has added another hour to our time account it could be an investment that will pay off in the future when she herself might be in need of companionship or practical help. Put it. At the university of casa sociologist yarnall shaw been conducts lectures and research on social isolation and friendship. Now and then he enjoys being on his own and having time to think but being alone by choice is not the same as being only. At a wall in the sense of taking time out and focusing on yourself or ways in which you also test the boundaries of being human and so many signs of costus that in a way being alone is a very particular and in the modern day also highly prized Life Experience and its a specifically human one you want encounter any other way. And this withdrawal is actually a unique opportunity to learn something about yourself so you can view it positively to stuff on ones or qualities that. Still few people can stand being alone for too long after a certain time the desire for contact interaction becomes overpowering. Experts call this impulse to seek the company of others the real affiliation motive. Here mentions its a talent isnt possible at all social creatures which ultimately means that we as a group needed others to survive because think about the stone age alone is didnt get far according to this theory the feeling of loneliness evolved as a warning signal so that when we are 11 and missing our group when we no longer feel part of it we suffer. And that makes us try to rejoin now try stalked im not so sure thats her physical contact hope of it out of. The biology of loneliness is also being probed in southern germany. Here near xylem in play constance 200 barbary apes live on 20 hectares of woodland in groups of up to 40 animals. Behavioral ecologist like Nadine Miller kline hope their research on these primates will provide insights into Human Evolution and that we cant really look at whether animals are lonely because thats subjective what we can look at is social isolation and integration and does how do they influence the health of the. Barbary apes have very differentiated social relationships the males tend to forge a close alliance of similar human friendships those who dont make enough ties remain on the groups fringes. And always choose one animal to be your focal subject and then collect data for certain amount of time once youve gathered the data you can see how many partners you animal interacted with how many it groomed and how many partners it came into contact. From that you can draw conclusions about the animals relationship structure its. Well connected males are more successful in the fight to climb the social ladder they also make. The news in the palm side when lots of aggression it has like now during mating season and animals have a lot of aggressive interaction that can be stressful but the animals who have strong connections experience less stress the animals who have a few strong connections and are a bit isolated are far more affected by the stressful situation that i thought is a stress because its one few female. She tests for the presence of a stress hormone cortisone the animal species. Apes release cortisol when they feel threatened as a human. This response triggers our emergency fight or flight response. That boosts our Blood Pressure blood sugar level and circulatory system. Our immune systems and digestion are dialed down. Chronically Lonely People become chronically stressed which can seriously impact their health. The risk of having a heart attack rises by 29 percent a stroke by 32 percent and the likelihood of dying prematurely by 30 percent. So chronic loneliness reduces Life Expectancy as much as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Having high Blood Pressure. Or being obese. In the u. K. The British Red Cross says loneliness has reached epidemic levels here over 9000000 people are almost one 5th of the population have said they are always or often lonely. In 20000 the government appointed a loneliness minister. Tracey crouch pursues a strategy called social prescribing. We find out how it works and from the southwest of england. From in the mendip district in somerset has just 28000 residents but it boasts an Extraordinary HealthServices Network run by doctors and dedicated locals. Are here. Today a few of them are paying a visit to the mens shed. Its a workshop designed to combat social isolation. Men often find it harder to admit theyre lonely than women. Patrick abraham started the project 2 years ago. If you put 12 men over 65. 00 in a room and said talk to each other about your life your relationships your health and your aspirations 6 will leave the room immediately and the other cities will sit around the walls and say nothing if you throw a broken little mother in there and say hey guys fix that within 2 hours i lol know whose what i do is a skill say i have who they are and then names and Everything Else. The longer people are socially isolated the tougher it is for them to reintegrate thats how it was for me in williams after a long stint living in australia he returned to frome 2 years ago. Although his sister lives here hes had trouble meeting people my fellow im a bit on the outs so he you know like a group of people when youre on the outside youve got to make the effort to step in and well show you the 1st really scene sister found out about the men shed on the internet through the Health Connections network and urged him to go there. Or came down and open the door. For the body looks just like the usual pub you know you walk over the door who came nobody looks at you if you didnt know what were. Going to they were said come in come in you know we have a laugh and a joke but when we talk about it talk about things in general you know we can fix breakfast and 3 minutes early and a lot of stuff you know once a week gives you something to fill a need for to calm you know youve got to calm you come because you want to and because you want to meet people. Today julie carey downs is also visiting the mention she works for Health Connections mendip and has an overview of all the networks initiatives its her job to maintain and expand the network in the nation you just say. She asks at the shed could open in the evenings too so younger men could come i can think of people who are working with d. V. D. And starting to come in because its like once they finished but they quit i suppose i should say if they if they could i think from a say yes this is just a 7 and 66 so i stopped it might be a good basis for this is that way my aunt juley culture selfhelp connector. Thats because she connects doctors and patients with the many public and private outreach programs for people in from. The community itself to fall to feel that. They not be in. Told to do a wet a fucking thing if it actually part of it and they feel like i know that i once people have they tend to. Sort of join in things are more like. 6 years ago a doctor at this medical practice declared war on loneliness. Local dr helen kingston realized many of her patients were suffering from social isolation. And so was their health. Im part of this community it matters to me what happens here and i know my patients very well ive been here for over 20 years thorough when you see individuals that youve got to know very well and see them struggling its a human