Member-only story
Alone Time Is Essential to a Healthy Social Life
Breaking news for introverts: New research on the ‘social biome’ shows that solitude is crucial for well-being
Scientists are only just beginning to understand the full reach of the gut microbiome — the diverse community of microorganisms living inside your digestive tract that’s been shown to influence everything from your immune system to your mood. Maintaining balance in this community, a growing body of research suggests, has a strong ripple effect for both mental and physical health.
It’s also, as the communications researcher Jeffrey Hall argues, a great metaphor. The microbiome is the framing he uses to explain his concept of the “social biome,” the idea that social well-being depends on a regular, varied mix of interactions.
“We were fascinated with the idea that you have this balance in your body of things that help keep you healthy,” says Hall, a professor at the University of Kansas. “When it’s out of balance, you don’t flourish, and you get sick. This was us saying, ‘Let’s think about human interaction like nutrition.’”
In a new study in the journal Human Communication Research, Hall and co-author Andy Merolla, a professor of communication at the University of California, Santa Barbara, analyzed more than 10,000 social interactions recorded in the diaries of approximately 400 participants. From their source material, the two researchers were able to pick out five key components to a healthy social biome.
First, there’s the ratio of connectedness to energy spent. “The best interactions make us feel very connected but don’t take a lot of effort,” Hall says. “Like hanging out with your best friend. That’s a nourishing social interaction.” Equally important, they found, are the level of closeness you feel with the people you see regularly, what you talk about — a mix of deep and surface-level conversations is best — and how much choice you have in who you interact with and when.
But the final component they identified was both the most surprising and one of the most vital: solitude.
“We’d seen lots of research suggesting more social interactions are better,” Hall says, but “the one that had the strongest…
