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Washington Post: Five myths about loneliness

08 Jan 2021
A study in the Academy of Management Review found that when people in open-plan offices did speak to one another, they tended to do so for shorter periods and more superficially.

Originally found at The Washington Post, by Noreena Hertz.

Lots of people are lonely these days. Months of stay-at-home orders and other limits on face-to-face contact are taking their toll. But even before the pandemic introduced us to terms like “social distancing,” loneliness was a defining condition of the 21st century: More than a fifth of U.S. adults said in a 2018 Kaiser Family Foundation survey that they “often” or “always” felt lonely, lacking in companionship, left out or isolated. Britain even appointed a minister for loneliness three years ago to confront the problem. Why did we become so lonely? Who is most afflicted? And what harms does it cause? Misconceptions persist around each of these questions; here are five of the most common.


Continue reading the original article at The Washington Post.

Read the original research in Academy of Management Review.

Also read this AOM Insights summary citing this research.

Check out this infographic based on the original research.

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