Loneliness increases risk of future unemployment, says study

Exeter (England), April 29: Experiencing loneliness seems to lead to a higher risk of future unemployment, suggests new research. As per the study, people who say they "often feel lonely" are much more likely to lose their jobs later. The findings of the study were published in the journal "BMC Public Health" by a team led by University of Exeter researchers. Previous research has shown that being unemployed can lead to loneliness, but this is the first study to look into whether the opposite is true for the working-age population. Their research also confirmed prior findings that those who were unemployed at the time were more likely to be lonely later. "Given the persisting and potentially scarring effects of both loneliness and unemployment on health and the economy, prevention of both experiences is key. Decreased loneliness could mitigate unemployment, and employment abate loneliness, which may, in turn, relate positively to other factors including health and quality of life," lead author Nia Morrish, of the University of Exeter, said. "Thus, particular attention should be paid to loneliness with additional support from employers and the government to improve health and wellbeing. Our research was largely conducted pre-pandemic, however, we suspect this issue maybe even more pressing, with more people working from home and potentially experiencing isolation because of anxieties around covid," the researchers added. The study analyzed data from over 15,000 people in the Understanding Society Household Longitudinal Study, which was mostly pre-pandemic. The researchers looked at responses from individuals from 2017 to 2019 and then again from 2018 to 2020, controlling for age, gender, ethnicity, education, marital status, household composition, number of own children, and region. Also Read | AAP to set up mohalla clinics in Punjab; process starts "Loneliness is an incredibly important societal problem, which is frequently considered of only in terms of its impact on mental health and wellness," said senior author Professor Antonieta Medina-Lara. "Our findings indicate that there may also be wider implications, which could have negative impacts on individuals and the economy. We need to explore this further, and it could lay the foundations for employers or policymakers to tackle loneliness with a view to keeping more people in work," Antonieta Medina-Lara added. Paper co-author Dr Ruben Mujica-Mota, Associate Professor of Health Economics in the University of Leeds' School of Medicine, further added that "While previous research has shown that unemployment can cause loneliness, ours is the first study to identify those lonely people of any working age are at greater risk of becoming unemployed." "Our findings show that these two issues can interact and create a self-fulfilling, negative cycle. There is a need for greater recognition of the wider societal impacts of loneliness in the working-age population," the co-author said. Also Read | India reports 3,377 new Covid-19 cases in 24 hours -PTC News