Loneliness increases or shortens life?

Loneliness increases or shortens life?

A shocking study has found that loneliness and unhappiness are more harmful to health than smoking. The researchers found that emotions speed up people's biological clocks more than cigarettes, according to the British newspaper, "Daily Mail".

The results of the study revealed that feeling lonely, unhappy and hopeless adds up to one year and eight months to a person's life, which is five months more than smoking.

Research has also shown that damage to the body's biological clock increases the risk of Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, heart disease and other diseases, and researchers even believe that chronic inflammation caused by feeling unhappy causes damage to vital cells and organs.

Everyone has a chronological age, or the years and months they lived alive. However, we all also have a biological age, which estimates body decline based on factors including blood, kidney status, and body mass index (BMI).

Researchers from Stanford University in California and Deep Longevity, a Hong Kong company, relied on data from 12000 Chinese adults, of middle and older age groups. About a third of them had an underlying condition, including lung disease, cancer, and stroke survival.

Using blood samples, surveys and medical data, the experts created an aging model to predict the biological age of the participants. The participants were then matched by age and gender, and their results were compared with those who were aging faster.

The results showed that feeling lonely or unhappy was the biggest predictor of a faster biological decline. It was followed by smoking, which added a year and three months to a person's lifespan. They also found that being male added up to five months to life.

Other factors associated with accelerated aging included living in a rural area, which increased an individual's biological life by four months, which the scientists said may be due to poor nutrition or the lack of availability of medical services.

It was also found that celibacy, which has long been associated with early death, raises a person's age by about four months.

The study only looked at middle-aged and older adults, which means it's not clear if the results are spreading to younger age groups.

The scientists did not ask participants how many cigarettes they smoked per day.

Previous research from the National Institute on Aging (NIH) has also linked loneliness and isolation to aging, saying it equates to about 15 cigarettes a day. This research also found that being alone for most of the day reduced the ability to perform daily tasks such as climbing stairs or walking.