When we feel lonely, many of us have a tendency to believe we’re the only one experiencing it.
“If I really want to go out on a Saturday night and I’m at home alone, I’m likely imagining that every other person in the world is out having a good time,” human connection scientist Dr Ali Walker tells Women’s Agenda.
In reality, that couldn’t be further from the truth. According to the latest Medibank Loneliness Population Index, more than half of Australians say they feel lonely in a typical week.
This is one of the key reasons that challenge the stigma associated with loneliness in Australia is key to helping people feel less shame around the experience.
“Every single person in the world experiences loneliness at different times and for different reasons,” Dr Walker says.
“So instead of feeling ashamed when you experience it, we have to actually say to ourselves: ‘this is normal and it’s just a signal telling me that I would like my relationships to be different in some way’.”
This Mental Health Awareness Month, Women’s Agenda is joining forces with Medibank to highlight the importance of better understanding our experiences of loneliness.
“The way that I define loneliness is simply a disconnect in what you want to experience and what you are experiencing. That’s it,” Dr Walker says.
“Some of the most profound experiences of loneliness can be between romantic partners. They might be sitting next to each other on the couch or out at a restaurant at dinner, and they’re just not connecting, then finding it really difficult to be with each other. They are actually feeling lonely.”
How do women experience loneliness?
While men and women broadly experience similar levels of loneliness, research from Medibank shows Australian women were slightly more likely to rate highly on UCLA’s loneliness scale.
Indeed, 33 per cent of women scored ‘high’ on the scale, compared to 31 per cent of men. For young women aged 16-24, 41 per cent rated high on the scale, more than any other age group.
Growing apart from friends and cost of living pressures were cited by women as the top two triggers of loneliness.
Dr Ali Walker notes that there are lots of structural factors that lead to loneliness and it’s time to move beyond viewing it as a personal condition. Some of these structural issues include language barriers, or living with a mental health condition.
“If people are feeling lonely, we tend to say things like, ‘you’ve just got to put yourself out there’ or ‘you’ve just got to find some hobbies’,” she says.
“We give all this advice to people about being vulnerable emotionally to create new connections. But to treat loneliness as a lack of effort on their part is almost making the problem worse.”
How do Aussie women manage loneliness?
Throughout history, human connection has actually been much more simple than it is today. In the modern world, we’ve really got to work for it.
It’s only in the last few generations that people have had to become intentional about human connection, Dr Walker explains.
“It’s not actually natural for a lot of us to work on human connection. It’s something that deep down, we feel should just be there, we should just have friends, we should just have a partner, we should just have something to do on a weekend,” she says.
These expectations make managing loneliness a difficult task. But research shows women are slightly more likely than men to take steps to do so.
Among women who self-identified as experiencing loneliness in Medibank’s research 58 per cent said they try to manage it by distracting themselves with entertainment like television or the internet, and 67 per cent of women said they would try to spend more face-to-face time with their friends and family.
But there are also many things standing in the way of Aussie women who feel lonely.
Forty per cent of women said they didn’t want to feel like a burden to others, while 28 per cent said they feel too embarrassed about feeling lonely and 27 per cent said they didn’t feel like it’s a big enough issue.
Meanwhile, more than a quarter of women who experience loneliness did not have the financial means to get support.
Dr Walker argues that there’s a lack of education about loneliness and it’s common for people to misdiagnose it.
“People tend to feel lonely, name it as something like ‘sadness’ or ‘depression’ or ‘shame’, feel horrible, get lost in the feeling, and then do something to numb it.”
After that, people move on with their day, leading to a habitual process of experiencing loneliness again and again.
What can we do better?
Once you’ve identified that you’re experiencing loneliness, Dr Walker says we need to switch our mindset to ask ourselves how we would prefer to be feeling right now. This can be the starting point for engaging in a positive intervention.
“Human connection is just as vital a need to our health and well being as our nutritional physical needs. It’s just about figuring out what human connection looks like for you.”
The key is asking ourselves questions about what lights us up in a social situation. Are you someone that loves one-on-one conversations where you can be honest and raw? Or are you someone who just wants to have a light-hearted chat with a group of people?
It might also mean looking to connect with those who experience similar structural barriers to you.
“If you have a language barrier, it may be that you need to find some more online communities, or you might seek out others who speak your language or even listen to music in your language,” Dr Walker says.
Otherwise, talking to a trusted person, or a GP or mental health specialist could be helpful in working out how to take that first step.
To find out more about loneliness tune into Dr Ali Walker on the latest season of We Are Lonely podcast and follow as nine young Australians share their personal journeys and experiences with loneliness to find meaningful connections. Listen to wherever you get your podcasts.
🎧 We Are Lonely | Podcast on Spotify
🎧 We Are Lonely | Podcast on (apple.com)
About the research
Research commissioned by FiftyFive5 on behalf of Medibank. Research was conducted in July 2024, among a sample of (n=4,131) Australians.
If you need to speak to someone now, you can reach Beyond Blue on 1300 224 636 or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.