‘Did you experience loneliness a lot of the day yesterday?’ This was the question posed to the participants of Gallup’s survey. The answers were a cause of concern, for they lead to the conclusion that 20 per cent of the world’s employees experience daily loneliness. Globally, one in five employees admitted to feeling lonely for a major part of the previous day. Surprisingly, those under the age of 35 seem to be experiencing daily loneliness more than the older employees. Employees following a 100 per cent remote working model or work-from-home approach seem to be experiencing more loneliness than those working fully from office. Of those working from home all the time, 25 per cent are always experiencing loneliness, while 21 per cent experience it sometimes and only 16 per cent admit to not feeling lonely ever. A significant 22 per cent of those below the age of 35 admitted to feeling lonely for most of the previous day, while only 19 per cent of those aged above 35 shared the same feeling. That means, loneliness is affecting the younger lot and mostly those working remotely! Fully-remote employees are more lonely (25 per cent) than those who work fully from office on onsite (16 per cent).
Social isolation and chronic loneliness can be very damaging to the mental and physical well-being of people. When Lisa Berkman, professor, Harvard and senior scientist, Gallup, and her team studied the relationship between social and community ties and mortality rates over a nine-year period, she learnt that mortality was a higher risk among those who lacked societal ties and were disconnected from the community. In fact, their risk of mortality was twice more than those who were socially active. These risks of social isolation are not dependent on the physical health or socioeconomic status of the people.
Only 20 per cent of working adults were found to be lonely, compared to 32 per cent of unemployed adults. Clearly, loneliness can be taken care of by work itself, regardless of age. Work offers benefits even without in-person interactions.
According to a Gallup research, social time, whether over the phone, video calls or through texting are capable of uplifting the mood. However, there is a limit to this tech interaction. After all, how many messages can people send and for how long can this kind of messaging or texting engage them? And soon, the good mood starts vanishing.
No wonder, the State of the Global Workplace report reveals that less loneliness is seen in people working onsite.
The primary data in this report is obtained from the Gallup World Poll, through which Gallup has conducted surveys of the world’s adult population. The survey is typically done every year via in-person interactions or by telephone, covering more than 160 countries, covering 1,000 individuals in each country or area
Additionally, Gallup also collects random samples of working populations in Germany and the US via online surveys.