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Suburbs aren't lonelier than cities
What the data shows
It sounds obvious that city people, walking past strangers all day, would be less lonely than suburbanites shut inside a house or a car. The data doesn't show it. In a survey of 616 adults, loneliness affected 40.8% of suburban residents, 54.3% of urban residents, 50.7% in small rural areas, and 59.0% in large rural areas, although the suburban advantage was not statistically significant once the researchers adjusted for other factors. Ten years of American Time Use Surveys show no meaningful difference in how much suburbanites and city dwellers socialize, and a review of 57 studies found no systematic link between loneliness and any measurable feature of the built environment.
What cures loneliness
Relationships rarely form just because people pass each other on a sidewalk. A few come from random conversations, but most form through work, friends of friends, and shared hobbies. Meeting a lot of new people is fun, but loneliness fades with repeated interaction with people you know and care about. Ten parties full of strangers leave you less connected than two close friends over for dinner, and Japan has the world's best cities alongside widespread loneliness.
How suburbs help
Suburbs have features that make those close ties easier to keep up. A big house is built for entertaining, and a dinner party, TV night, or game night fits there far more easily than in a tiny Manhattan apartment. Short drives make it simple to pop over and hang out with friends.
Why does repeated contact build friendship?
Psychologist Robert Zajonc reported in 1968 that people tend to like things and faces more the more often they encounter them, a finding known as the mere-exposure effect. In a 1950 study of MIT married-student housing, Leon Festinger and colleagues found that residents were most likely to befriend neighbors who lived close by. People whose doors sat near a stairway met more neighbors than people in other spots. Regular, low-stakes contact is how acquaintances turn into friends.
Why is loneliness hard to measure?
Researchers separate social isolation, which counts contacts and can be observed, from loneliness, which is the felt gap between the relationships a person has and the ones they want. Because loneliness is a feeling, studies rely on questionnaires such as the UCLA Loneliness Scale, developed in the late 1970s. Two people with identical numbers of friends can score very differently. Survey wording and cutoffs also shift the percentages from one study to the next.
How can big cities be so lonely?
Japan has some of the world's largest and best-run cities, and it also has a well-documented loneliness problem. The government appointed a minister for loneliness in 2021, following the example of the United Kingdom in 2018. Japan has also given a name to hikikomori, people who withdraw from social life for months or years. Dense living puts many people within reach of each other without guaranteeing they connect.
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