We are social creatures, almost everything that makes us happy comes from being with other people. We enjoy spending time with others in almost every setting, from bars to movies to road trips and just lounging on the beach. Of course, we all need some time away, but that doesn’t detract from our truly social nature.

Some of us need a little more of a social life than others, but even the most recluse introverts need a friend or two every now and again, and when we don’t get that, we can suffer. While being alone might make you feel a little sad, left out, or even just bored, as the Atlantic points out, there can be worse effects:

Among the lonely, the areas of their brains related to attention lit up much more quickly than those of the other subjects when they saw words related to social isolation like ‘‘excluded,’’ ‘‘foe’’ and ‘‘detached’’ than when they saw generally negative words like ‘‘frustrated’’ and ‘‘vomit.’’ Their brains were also far less engaged by words with a positive connotation compared with those of the socially connected volunteers.

The results show that the lonelier you are, the more your attention is drawn toward negative social information … Lonely people seemed inadvertently hypervigilant to social threats. Rather poignantly, such thinking itself most likely makes the loneliness worse, he says, by nudging the lonely to ‘‘unknowingly act in a more defensive, hostile way toward the others with whom they would like to connect.’’

This raises concerns, especially among the elderly whose number of friends and family starts to dwindle. It also helps to show the importance of keeping at least a few good people around to socialize with from time to time. Check out the full post for more details.

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