Only the lonely: Kiwis
Our response to Covid was supposed to be marked by kindness and the ‘team of five million’, but Mandy Te reports that many groups of society feel left out.
Loneliness – an unmet need for social connection – has always been a feeling people have experienced at some point in their lives.
But loneliness was fuelled by the coronavirus lockdown in 2020 as social contact diminished. Its effects are still being felt postlockdown.
According to research by The Helen Clark Foundation, and engineering professional services consulting firm WSP New Zealand, disabled people were four times more likely than nondisabled people to report feeling lonely most or all of the time.
Other groups more likely to feel lonely included unemployed people, people on low incomes, sole parents, new migrants, people of Asian descent and young people aged 18 to 24.
The research comes from Still Alone Together, which will be released on Tuesday. It follows the June 2020 report Alone Together.
In 2018, 39 per cent of respondents reported feeling lonely at least some of the time in the previous four weeks in the government’s General Social Survey. Still Alone Together found after lockdown alert level 4, there was an increase in self-reported loneliness.
‘‘We can speculate that for many people, the level 4 lockdown period was characterised by more frequent social contact (albeit virtual rather than in person), and conscious ‘checking in’ on friends, neighbours and relatives,’’ the report said.
The report said when life went back to ‘‘normal’’, many people returned to busy lives and ‘‘conscious contact’’ with others, especially those who were potentially more isolated, reduced.
While the overall picture showed that loneliness had returned close to the prepandemic baseline at the end of 2020, ‘‘severe and ongoing loneliness’’ felt by some marginalised groups was being masked, it said.
By the end of 2020, 11.3 per cent of disabled people reported feeling lonely most or all of the time – four times more likely than nondisabled people to report feeling lonely most or all of the time, the report said.
The high rates were ‘‘stark and alarming’’, the report said.
Prudence Walker, chief executive of the Disabled Persons Assembly, said ‘‘systemic issues such as inaccessible buildings, inadequate housing and high unemployment can make it difficult for disabled people to connect with others’’.
People who were unemployed had already self-reported higher levels of loneliness before Covid19 and this group ended 2020 feeling ‘‘significantly lonelier’’ than people with full or part-time employment.
People with low incomes could also find it challenging as they lacked access to resources that could reduce these feelings such as high-speed internet, warm homes and enough food.
Sole parents were particularly lonely in 2020 compared to adults in other households. ‘‘The year finished with 56 per cent of sole parents reporting some feelings of loneliness in the previous four weeks,’’ the report said.
More than half of people surveyed aged 18 to 24 experienced some feelings of loneliness. This was the only age group to do so in such numbers, the report said.
‘‘Loneliness tends to coincide with periods of major life transition, of which there are many during early adulthood.’’
‘‘It is also likely that high levels of social media and digital technology use exacerbate youth loneliness, although these can also be powerful tools for connection,’’ the report said.
Pa¯ keha and Pacific peoples were the ethnic groups least likely to report feeling lonely, while
Ma¯ ori were the most likely to report feeling lonely most or all of the time.
There were also factors that were protective and preventative of loneliness, such as the strong emphasis on family and collective wellbeing in some cultures.
People of Asian descent were most likely overall to report some feelings of loneliness in the previous four weeks.
During Covid-19, Asian people experienced increased racism and discrimination in Aotearoa and around the world.
Recent migrants compared to long-term migrants and people born in New Zealand were more likely to report feeling lonely.
The report suggested the Government ensured people had enough money, closed the digital divide, helped communities ‘‘do their magic’’ by investing in community-led investment funds, create friendly neighbourhoods, prioritised people who were already lonely, and invested in frontline mental health.