We generally think of the holidays as a time for gathering, being with family and friends.

But new research shows that more than 300,000 New Jerseyans will spend this holiday season alone.

And loneliness, especially during the holidays, is actually a growing mental health issue that impacts millions and can actually lead to higher mortality rates.

Senator Andrew Zwicker recently wrote an op ed on the issue, pointing to legislation that would offer more support here in the state.

I'm joined right now by Karen Fingerman, professor of human development and Family Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin to talk about what you can do if you're feeling lonely.

Dr. Fingerman, great to have you with us.

Now, your work really focuses on loneliness and how people can create meaningful connections around them for those who may not have a nuclear network around them.

What can they do?

How can they make connections?

Thanks for inviting me and give me an opportunity to talk about that.

So when you think about your social network, most of us are very aware of our close ties.

You know that we have friends, that we have family, or we're aware that we don't.

But when we as researchers look at who you interact with all day, you spend a lot of time with what we call weak ties.

So that might be your neighbors who you're you wouldn't call a friend, but you see them when you're out for your walk.

It might be the barista that knows your order that says, oh, extra whipped cream.

Right?

Or even the guy on the treadmill next to you when you go to the gym.

So these are people who are part of your life that you might not be as aware of.

And so we think of them when we assess who's in your social network.

Those would be people that we would include that you might not be as aware of.

And they're still important.

So do those people then act as a perhaps a salve to loneliness, or do we need to have more meaningful connections in kind of more in-depth ways in our lives to prevent loneliness from happening?

Well, actually, both sets of people matter and they serve different functions.

If you will.

So your close ties are the people that may give you emotional connection or a sense of belonging.

And they may also be the ones that would show up.

And, you know, get you to the doctor if you're sick.

But the people who do the best have both sets of ties.

So the weak ties give you stimulation and novelty.

You may have noticed during COVID that at the end of the day, if you were with your close ties, you didn't have a lot to talk about.

You know, I took a snack in the kitchen.

Yeah, me too.

And there wasn't a lot there, but talking to someone outside the household was stimulating, was still interesting.

At the same time, we can feel very grounded by those people.

So they're familiar.

They give us a sense of this is, you know, my life and I expect the same things to happen on a daily basis.

People might hear the issue of loneliness and say, well, that sounds like a sad problem, but in reality it can be a deadly problem because we know that there are increased rates of mortality among people who are lonely.

We know that.

In one study, it said that it's the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day in terms of the impact it can have on your health.

What is the impetus on us, on people in the community to go out and look for or seek out those who might be lonely?

How do we help.

In that case?

And it's the same thing if you are lonely.

We know that volunteering but giving to others is very beneficial.

It has sort of counter evidence to that that it's sort of like giving up 15 packs of cigarettes.

There's a tremendous bonus from volunteering.

So both if you want to alleviate other people's loneliness, but if you don't want to be lonely, you can counteract that effect.

Maybe you're not the type of person who likes to start a conversation with the barista, but look and find a group that's volunteering and all of a sudden you're there and you're with other people and you're doing something collectively that feels good, that feels meaningful.

And that's the antidote to loneliness for you and for the other people.

Dr. Karen Fingerman, this is great advice, especially around the holidays.

Thank you so much for being with us.

Thank you for giving me an opportunity to talk with you.