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John T. Cacioppo

Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection Paperback – August 10, 2009

by John T. Cacioppo (Author), William Patrick (Author)

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“One of the most important books about the human condition to appear in a decade.”―Daniel Gilbert, author of Stumbling on Happiness

University of Chicago social neuroscientist John T. Cacioppo unveils his pioneering research on the startling effects of loneliness: a sense of isolation or social rejection disrupts not only our thinking abilities and will power but also our immune systems, and can be as damaging as obesity or smoking. A blend of biological and social science, this book demonstrates that, as individuals and as a society, we have everything to gain, and everything to lose, in how well or how poorly we manage our need for social bonds.

12 illustrations

Print length

336 pages
Language

English
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

August 10, 2009
Dimensions

5.6 x 0.8 x 8.3 inches
ISBN-10

0393335283
ISBN-13

978-0393335286
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"A magnificent exposé."
― Frans de Waal

"Wise, beautifully written, and often funny…a tour-de-force."
― Shelley E. Taylor, professor of psychology, University of California, Los Angeles

"Superb."
― Library Journal

About the Author

John T. Cacioppo (1951―2018) was a psychology professor at the University of Chicago and director of the university’s Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience. He was the author of more than a dozen books, including Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connections.

William Patrick, former editor for science and medicine at Harvard University Press, is editor in chief of the Journal of Life Sciences. He lives in Ipswich, Massachusetts.

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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (August 10, 2009)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393335283
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393335286
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.1 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.6 x 0.8 x 8.3 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #52,330 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #298 in Emotional Mental Health
- #336 in History & Philosophy of Science (Books)
- #356 in Popular Social Psychology & Interactions

Customer Reviews:
290 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		66%
4 star		21%
3 star		7%
2 star		4%
1 star		2%

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Top reviews from the United States

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AmazonCustomer

Not recommended

Reviewed in the United States on March 18, 2019

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As interesting as the science is, I don't recommend this book to anyone who is affected by loneliness. As someone who is very lonely, I am well aware about how it negatively impacts my life. The book felt like it was 'rubbing it in my face'.

39 people found this helpful

Helpful

R. Deignan

Part Scholarship, Part Sci-Fi

Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2019

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Book is terrifically interesting when it focuses on the case studies, group experiments, and measurable findings. But when it veers off and the footnotes end, it loses steam. The author has completed extensive research into the effects of loneliness on the human brain and behaviors, including its impact on cognitive skills, ability to complete specific tasks, etc.. I enjoyed learning about how compliments and feelings of adequacy or acceptance by peers greatly improved cognitive abilities, while the lack of esteem/self-worth or even negative feedback caused study participants to perform poorly. It says a lot about how human beings need one another.

As I read further, though, it became clear that the author's primary goal (and purpose for this book) is: explain loneliness and all of its related effects in purely materialistic (philosophical materialism) terms. Accordingly, loneliness is just a matter of evolutionary behaviors and responses developed in the struggle for survival. The author supports this thesis through suppositions about how hominids formed communities in order to survive. Here the extensive footnoting and source citations become scant because the author is relying on imagination. These sections say more about how vividly the opening third of Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" impacted the author than how loneliness boils down to juices pulsing through the brain.

There's a gap between the tangible research he's devoted his professional life to and the imaginary scenes he's invented. He's operating from a paradigm that the evidence will only (and obviously) support a naturalistic/materialistic theory about loneliness. He's certain that feelings associated with loneliness, such as isolation, shame, and unworthiness are tantamount to how heat tells us fire will burn us, and nothing more. Without sufficient evidence to support or confirm this, the book is really only interesting for its case studies and their summarized findings.

22 people found this helpful

Helpful

Mary R. Kolk

Loneliness is a voice that is crying in the wilderness. We all need to hear and heed that cry. Human connection is vital!

Reviewed in the United States on May 24, 2018

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I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Cacioppo and his lovely wife a few years ago at a lecture he gave at Baldwin Wallace University in Berea Ohio. He was an intelligent, caring person. His book documents his life's work on loneliness. The book is part of his legacy. He past away earlier this month. The book reveals the all too often hidden devastating effects that loneliness has on people who is chronically alone. It demonstrates how being alone can lead to aging and declining health. Quoting Dr. Cacciopo from his book "Loneliness": The data tell us that loneliness seriously accelerates age-related declines in health and well-being, yet the idea of promoting connection is rarely discussed alongside the heated issues of the cost of pharmaceuticals and other medical interventions necessary to deal with an increasingly lonely, isolated, and agin population."

He adds: "Given the statistical impact of loneliness, if its effects were caused by an impurityin our air or water, perhaps now there would be congressional hearings on how to reduce it. Perhaps we can hope for a similar awakening to the idea, grounded in rigorous science, that restorning bonds among people can be cost-effective and practical point of leverage for solving some of our most pressing social problems, not the least of which is the looming crisis in health care and eldercare."

Dr. Cacioppo points out the need for a place for people to gather and demonstrates how places of faith worship have fulfilled that need in the past. "The type of Christianity tht went on to become the primary structural element of the Western world focused on a simple message of self-esteem - "The kingdom of God is within you" -- combined with communal meals and even communal living. Its streamlined theology set aside the complex cleansing rituals of Judaism, and it presented evil less in mystical terms and more as a question of the behavior of one person toward another. The church that survived and prospered extended the basic ethics of the Hebrew tradition -- already a strong source of social support -- explicitly into the individual's inner life, creating a prohibitions against mere thoughts that were harmful to social connections: anger, hatred, misdirected lust. It dispensed with the temple in Jerusalem as the center of religious life, but maintained rituals to sanctify the basic elements of ordinary human existence: reproduction (marriage), birth (baptism), illness (anointment), and death (last rites). By way of these ceremonies it provided guidelines for social connection throughout the life cycle, making this universal church a practical social convention; It offered self-worth, it buried the dead, and it provided for the poor. Like Judaism, Islam, Confucianism and Buddhism, Christianity regulated all social transactions with the community, ranging from relationships within marriage and the family to standards for conducting business and dealing with neighbors."

Social connections are life saving connections. When we gather with our family, friends and neighbors, we produce the "happiness hormone" Oxcytocin. When we are isolated, when we move far away from family, when we begin to age and lose the close contact with our children our friends, when we stop going to church because the beliefs we once held are no longer relevant to us, is when we begin our own decline. We need other people in our lives. It's as important to have people who care about us and who we care about as it is to have the very oxygen we breath in the air.

I am a technology buff. I love my Apple devices. However, after reading Loneliness, I have awakened my appreciation of and my awareness for the need to put those amazing devices in their separate compartments in my life. If we do not break the hold technology has on the majority of people today, we will suffer the coming consequences of being Avatar's instead of human beings.

I love and appreciate Dr. Cacioppo's work on loneliness. It's a topic all too often not only disregarded in todays fast paced society but an aspect of life that has faded into the background of the screens of our devices. We no longer sit on a porch on a warm summer evening sharing a cool drink or a beer with a couple of neighbors while the children play around us. We are all too busy checking our devices, making comments on Facebook, or playing video games. As Dr. Caccioppo points out people need real people in front of them - talking, laughing, sharing, learning from each other. We need to see their faces, feel their emotions, read their body language and feel their touch. Emoticon's are a very poor attempt to replace actual living human beings in our lives.

24 people found this helpful

Helpful

Robert Kelly-Schleyer, M.A.

Which came first? Chicken? Egg?

Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2021

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Depression? Loneliness? Both? I’ve been diagnosed with lifelong Depression. I wrote a book to earn a Masters in a psychology. Not once did I use the word “loneliness,” throughout my text. Now, reading this book I’m able to connect the dots, able to see the synergy between these two conditions. This text is frontline Neuroscience! Now I’ll soon be revising my book.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Landon S

Informative

Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2020

Verified Purchase

I appreciated the books information. It seems a little odd though in how scientific it discussed loneliness and the need for human connection. Once I was finished it felt more like a report with little warmth to the writing. If the author had been talking to me I would have felt informed but not connected to the author. I guess I expected there to be a degree of empathy or anecdotal sharing or the sort but I didn’t get that.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

M. Cheffo

the description seemed like the book was for regular people

Reviewed in the United States on July 16, 2018

Verified Purchase

too clinical. the description seemed like the book was for regular people, not doctors etc...

12 people found this helpful

Helpful

Maritza Lowinger

Good but not excellent

Reviewed in the United States on September 24, 2020

Verified Purchase

What is the difference between loneliness and being lonely?? Dont know. But either way is not good. But then, can you overcome such terrible feeling? The book mentioned a lot of experiments to back up all the statements the authors tried to explain. However, it was too long, repited itself in many parts and I had to skip some other parts wich I found not interested.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Daniela. G.

No man is an island

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 27, 2016

Verified Purchase

Finally a book that deals with man living in society! Far too many books focus only on the individual, as if we are all living in an ivory tower without any influence from our environment, friends and family. Turns out that social contact is a basic component of human nature - like it or not.

We all may have suspected at one time or another that some people have influence over us - again, like it or not. The stupidest thing you can do to yourself is denying the fact that you actually care about what others think of you (or just very few people, but you still care).

Unfortunately, Western society is much too focussed on the individual, while the idea of one against all (or one above all) is toxic. We are programmed to live in groups, just like any other advance monkey and we better accept the fact and deal with it in the best possible way, for our sake and the sake of humankind at large. And what would be wrong in a world where people actually aknowledge others and care about them?

8 people found this helpful

John Morgan

If you consider yourself lonely or not, this is well worth a read.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 16, 2014

Verified Purchase

Firstly you do not have to consider yourself "lonely" to get an awful lot from this book. If however , you do suspect that you or a loved one are becoming aware of feelings of loneliness, this book will help explain what you may be feeling, possibly explain why these feelings have presented themselves and in doing so, give you knowledge to deal with any anxiety and fear you may be feeling when looking into your present situation and give you an outlook and options for the future.

This is not designed as a self help book but, with solid evidence It clearly explains why loneliness is a perfectly normal emotion, the effects it can have on your health and how the need for connection binds us all and has done since the beginning.

Its well written, easy to connect with and a great read full of "aha" moments that certainly rang true with me.

This is a book that I have high lighted passages within and will return to again and again.

A book on an area of human nature and social connection, written in perfectly understandable, lay terms.

16 people found this helpful

Alex

Quality of the print is awful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 24, 2020

Verified Purchase

I don't have any complaints about the content but the book itself feels SUPER cheap: pages are thin, the cover is asymmetrical (black line on the right side is half the size of the black line on the left) and super thin as well. It's not covered with any protective layer: you touch with dirty hands, it sticks forever. Overall, if you want an edition that will last you some time, I suggest you find it in your local book store and check the quality yourself.

isabelles friend

the language can at times be heavy going and needs ...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 29, 2014

Verified Purchase

the language can at times be heavy going and needs a reread, however it gave me a lot of insight in to difficulties I now have as an adult in social situations and where those have steamed from. no advise on how to change things however.

6 people found this helpful

Joyce Alves

Not new poor quality

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 16, 2021

Verified Purchase

Book is not knew although I requested new , it has writings on it .

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