If Putnam felt the first raindrops of an antisocial revolution in America, the downpour is fully here, and we’re all getting washed away in the flood. From 2003 to 2022, American men reduced their average hours of face-to-face socializing by about 30 percent. For unmarried Americans, the decline was even bigger—more than 35 percent. For teenagers, it was more than 45 percent. Boys and girls ages 15 to 19 reduced their weekly social hangouts by more than three hours a week. In short, there is no statistical record of any other period in U.S. history when people have spent more time on their own.
And so what? one might reasonably ask. Aloneness is not loneliness. Not only that, one might point out, the texture of aloneness has changed. Solitude is less solitary than ever. With all the calling, texting, emailing, work chatting, DMing, and posting, we are producing unprecedented terabytes of interpersonal communication. If Americans were happy—about themselves, about their friends, about their country—then whining about parties of one would feel silly.
But for Americans in the 2020s, solitude, anxiety, and dissatisfaction seem to be rising in lockstep. Surveys show that Americans, and especially young Americans, have never been more anxious about their own lives or more depressed about the future of the country. Teenage depression and hopelessness are setting new annual records every year. The share of young people who say they have a close friend has plummeted. Americans have been so depressed about the state of the nation for so many consecutive years that by 2023, NBC pollsters said, “We have never before seen this level of sustained pessimism in the 30-year-plus history of the poll.”
I don’t think hanging out more will solve every problem. But I do think every social crisis in the U.S. could be helped somewhat if people spent a little more time with other people and a little less time gazing into digital content that’s designed to make us anxious and despondent about the world. This young century, Americans have collectively submitted to a national experiment to deprive ourselves of camaraderie in the world of flesh and steel, choosing instead to grow (and grow and grow) the time we spend by ourselves, gazing into screens, wherein actors and influencers often engage in the very acts of physical proximity that we deny ourselves. It’s been a weird experiment. And the results haven’t been pretty.
I’m old enough to see it in my own life. It’s not only technology but a decline of spirituality — one aspect being religion. So in a sense one major contributing factor is a change in philosophy.
An interesting example is looking at the arts — movies, television, music. Compare Woodstock 1969 to Woodstock 1999. That alone says it all. — Mikie
we are disconnected to the physical form of communication. There's tons of studies on the importance of physical connection — Christoffer
We're blasted by information in our alone time, and the information is "dead". — Christoffer
Together with the focus on individuality, the neoliberal ideology of the self, it has skewed the perspective people have of their ego. — Christoffer
What we need more today than ever is social groups not just meeting, but building something together within the physical realm. A step back from the individual perspective, the focus on the ego and into a collective realm in which social groups build something together. — Christoffer
the decline in spirituality and religion has created a void in the larger collective sense. — Christoffer
One such project, I would say, is building a new form of living that mitigates climate change. — Christoffer
Bowling Alone was developed from his 1995 essay entitled "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital". Putnam surveys the decline of social capital in the United States since 1950.
“Often, we don’t think something is beneficial unless it’s productive,” she said. We don’t always realize “that sitting around and resting with someone is still a productive state, and worthy of our time,” she said.
Liming, an associate professor of writing at Champlain College, said there wasn’t much research on hanging out and more was needed. But there’s evidence to suggest that face-to-face contact can strengthen emotional closeness. Plus, hanging out has an appealingly low barrier of entry, and it’s inexpensive: You don’t need reservations or tickets or special skills.
Hanging out also invites deeper conversation and builds intimacy, Liming said. (Dr. Ayers points to the trending desire on social media for a “couch friend” — a buddy that will sit with you on the couch and happily do nothing.)
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