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[Previous entry: "Halfbakery: Meme Catcher."] [Main Index] [Next entry: "New cat and girl."] 05/04/2005 Entry: "Loneliness kills." Loneliness kills. Afterall, humans are social animals by nature. I am curious if someone can be classified as socially active through virtual channels like IM, MMORPGs, online forums, etc. I'm also curious about the obvious cause vs. correlation issue here. These people could be suffering from mental illness like depression which affects the whole body. Low levels of social connectedness can adversely affect the body - lowering immune response and affecting heart health - highlight two new studies. One study demonstrates that first-year college students who mixed with fewer people or felt lonely had a lower immune response to influenza vaccination than their more gregarious or socially contented classmates. A second study suggests that men who are socially isolated have elevated levels of a blood marker for inflammation, which has a role in atherosclerosis. It was known that isolation has detrimental effects on heart health, but the study gives clues as to how this is mediated, says Sarah Pressman, a health psychologist a Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, US. See also: Genes most favored by natural selection in humans and apes involve immunity and timed cell death. I don't like terms like "arms race" and such for evolution. Natural selection is a simple mechanism with no plan or goal. Those who survive to have children pass on their genes. Those who have a genetic disability and cannot survive childhood infections simply don't pass on their weaker genes.