Do you feel lonely? Maybe it’s your brain’s fault

Social relationships are important for the well-being of human beings, yet people do not feel comfortable in society and prefer to be alone. A study published in The Journal of Neuroscience analyzed brain activity volunteers who define themselves as people lonely. The results suggest that the latter conceive of social relationships with others differently.

During this experiment, the scientists asked the 46 participants to think about the people who make up their social circle but also about celebrities. They were also asked to think of themselves. Meanwhile the activity of their brain was recorded thanks to a MRI functional brain. The area of ​​interest in this experiment is the prefrontal cortex median of which the cognitive role is complex : decision making, short and long term memory but also the emotional response to an event.

What is going on in the solitary brain?

Depending on who the participant is thinking of, the medial prefrontal cortex does not activate in the same way. Scientists have classified the brain patterns obtained after MRI according to three categories: that caused by the thought of a person belonging to the social circle of the participant (relatives and acquaintances), that aroused by the thought of a celebrity and finally, that inspired by the thought of his own person.

The stronger the social bond between people, the more the neuronal activity of the medial prefrontal cortex is that induced when the participants thought of themselves. But, at lonely people, these brain patterns are altered.

Brain activity differs greatly between self and a close friend or acquaintance, but little between a close friend and a celebrity. This could be the cognitive translation of the gap that some lonely people feel between themselves and others or the feeling of feeling alone even within a group. So loneliness could change the way the brain perceives social relationships.