Abstract
Discussions about social isolation have been extensive over the past few decades. A less sociable nature of social ties has been identified in Western societies. The phenomenon has been associated with demographic changes such as aging and living alone as well as changes in the use of new technologies. In this study we employ representative Finnish Time Use Surveys from three decades, 1987–1988 (n = 1887), 1999–2000 (n = 2673) and 2009–2010 (n = 1887) to examine the trends in social isolation, measured as time spent alone. Our results showed that between 1987 and 2010 the time spent alone increased by 124 min per day. The increase was linear and occurred in nearly all population groups. Structural factors, such as aging and an increase in the number of single households, are strongly associated with increased time spent alone. Time spent alone has increased, especially during leisure activities. Specifically, time spent watching television and using computers is associated with the decreasing tendency for face-to-face interaction.
Highlights
The trends and consequences of social isolation—along with the parallel concept of loneliness—have been debated and analysed in a lively manner during the last few decades
Time use surveys are underutilized in studying changes in social connections; for example, Fisher (2015) has noted that there is a lack of research on time spent alone utilizing time use surveys
When we compared time spent alone in relation to the amount of time spent in that certain place, we found that this solitary time increased steadily at home (1987: 15% → 2010: 26%), at work (1987: 16% → 2010: 27%) and in summer cottages (1987: 17% → 2010: 27%)
Summary
The trends and consequences of social isolation—along with the parallel concept of loneliness—have been debated and analysed in a lively manner during the last few decades. Studies from the United States have reported major declines in interpersonal and community networks (Putnam 2000). In 2006, McPherson and colleagues published a paper in the American Sociological Review analysing 20 years of social network data collected using the General Social Survey (GSS) and showed that from the mid-1980s to the mid-2000s, the average size of Americans’ conversational network shrunk by a third. The number of people who reported having nobody to talk to tripled. The critics raised some methodological issues (Paik and Sanchagrin 2013) and contradictory evidence (Hampton et al 2009, 2011).
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