Ethical Matters: Fighting Social Atrophy

Most of us have grown less sociable-and less capable of being sociable-in the years since the pandemic, and researcher and writer Dr. Sarah Stein Lubrano explains why.

She explores the most recent neuroscience research on how the brain responds to social isolation, and what the measurable sharp rise in hours spent alone over recent decades in countries like the US and the UK might mean for society.

Drawing on dozens of studies and her own interviews with the scientists behind them, she illuminates what really happens when people spend more time alone. In this Ethical Matters talk Sarah shows how the social brain can atrophy much like an unused muscle, diminishing the regions that govern memory, emotion, and social trust, while paradoxically activating those engaged in imagination. The result is a mind less able to read others, yet keener to invent stories about them.