Alone Together: Decoding the Paradox of Collective Isolation
Authored by Meredydd Hardie
Welcome to the second article in our series exploring the cultural forces and trends shaping our world in 2024.
In pharma and healthcare, it’s important to understand the industry-specific forces driving change. It’s also important to understand the larger forces impacting the wider culture. Our industry isn’t immune to these cultural forces—patients, HCPs, payers, and everyone else participate in the wider culture. Understanding cultural forces enables us to predict challenges and identify opportunities early. Our Klick Strategy community always looks for new angles to help us understand the world.
What to Know:
People lack connections, causing them to feel more isolated from each other, plus they experience a loss of belonging and community
We can see this cultural force manifesting through signals like the Friendship Recession and the Loneliness Epidemic, extreme self-care, the rise of shared event culture, and online buzzwords like “Main Character Syndrome” and “NPCs” (In gaming, an NPC is a non-player character. The term has evolved to describe real-life people who are perceived to lack independent thought)
Connections are fraying, but the need for community still exists; brands that foster that sense of community fill a real need
Community (formal and informal) is built into our assumptions about how healthcare works, and a lack of that support for patients and HCPs is going to challenge how treatment is delivered
What is “Collective Isolation”?
Last year, the Strategic Futures team at Klick discussed an emergent sentiment we called “Me, Myself and I.” A growing feeling from many people online and offline in many situations boils down to the sentiment that “no one else is going to look after me, so I’d better do it myself.” It can manifest as both intense loneliness and potential extreme individualism.
It’s almost paradoxical that so many are experiencing the same feelings of isolation with little support simultaneously, which is why we call this cultural force collective isolation. There are typically many signals and drivers when it comes to a force this big in culture. In this case, we can look to both the decline in trust around institutions that have bolstered connections in the past (see the previous cultural force around Questioning Reality for more on declining trust) and the fact that people lack real connections to others that might mitigate some of this extreme individualism.
Like the other cultural forces, the roots of collective isolation didn’t begin in 2023 and 2024, but we are seeing them come to a head. What’s different now is that people are beginning to recognize the impact of this force and make active efforts to create community in new ways.
The Signals
We introduced the concept of signals as “Leaves” in our model of cultural forces in the introductory article of this series. Signals are the fast-moving trends and fads that represent a moment in time. As a collection, they can indicate the direction culture is moving.
Several signals and factors tell us about this cultural force, including:
Signal: The Loneliness Epidemic
In 2023, the US Surgeon General issued an official advisory called “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation”. In it, he says, “People began to tell me they felt isolated, invisible, and insignificant. Even when they couldn’t put their finger on the word “lonely,” time and time again, people of all ages and socioeconomic backgrounds, from every corner of the country, would tell me, “I have to shoulder all of life’s burdens by myself,” or “if I disappear tomorrow, no one will even notice”
It was a lightbulb moment for me: social disconnection was far more common than I had realized
Health insurer Cigna reports that since 2018, when their survey was first conducted, there has been nearly a 13% rise in loneliness
Signal: The Friendship Recession
The trend of social disconnection goes hand in hand with the trend of shrinking friendship circles, sometimes called the Friendship Recession
In recent years, research that was first primarily connected with men has uncovered that social circles are shrinking for almost everyone. We have fewer good friends and a wider set of loose, often online, “acquaintances”
Sources: X - Harita Abraham, Aquaria
Signal: Event Culture
At the same time that we see this rise in evidence pointing to a lack of connection, we also see signals that tell us that the need for that connection hasn’t gone away
Big music events and other pop culture moments have become ways for people to create community and find connection. Look at the community formed around the Barbie movie, the Beyoncé Renaissance World Tour, and even the nostalgia people have for the Pokémon Go craze
People are doing more than just attending events (like in the past); they participate by wearing coordinated costumes or curated outfits and engage in little in-group rituals (like exchanging friendship bracelets or “everybody on mute,” where the crowd at the Beyoncé show goes silent together).
What Will It Mean to be Collectively Isolated in 2024?
People often turn to material things as solutions to feeling bad instead of relationships andhaving mostly online friends exacerbates extreme behaviors. People lack support networks in difficult times.
Care partners are critical in healthcare. What happens to patients when they lack people to rely on? They become more dependent on professionals. The HCP/patient relationship is going to become even more important as a point of connection
HCPs are people too and are also suffering from this collective isolation. This will only accelerate the existing levels of burnout and drive more from the profession
Retail stores and health centers have something in common—they can both focus on creating a sense of community that will increase connection
There will be increased development and implementation of innovative technologies and practices that enhance human connections in healthcare settings. Virtual health platforms, telemedicine solutions, and initiatives focusing on patient and healthcare provider experiences may gain prominence. The emphasis may be on creating environments that address medical needs and foster a sense of connection and support
As recognition of the impact of this cultural force becomes more widespread, we are already seeing an increase in intentional community-seeking, creating opportunities for communities and connections to form and grow
The Impact and Future of Collective Isolation
We see the impact of collective isolation all around us. It’s present as a factor in the increasing rates of mental illness and depression, the lack of patience and grace we have with each other both online and offline, and the commonly expressed sentiment of feeling overwhelmed. It’s much easier to feel overwhelmed if we feel like we have to carry the burden ourselves.
In the longer term, new, more intentional communities may address some of the feelings of isolation for some people, but collective isolation isn’t just a feeling, it’s a real demographic trend, and there will be serious impacts on systems and organizations that have depended on informal community ties to deliver services. Those communities and connections simply will not exist for many people.
How to Leverage This Cultural Force
Recommendations:
Consider that traditional expectations of community support and care partners for patients may not exist in the same ways we could rely on previously. We need to build in opportunities for connection and support like patient advocacy groups and non-traditional community
Get creative when thinking about what makes a community and what might alleviate isolation. A recent study showed that users of an “AI friend” actually had better mental health than non-users. New challenges require new thinking and innovative solutions
The best way to put this understanding into practice is to start with insights about your brand, competitors, and the market as a foundation. These are your own internal signals and can be combined with some of the signals in this article to project future scenarios. Using those scenarios, you can create a strategic roadmap that moves your brand and business towards a desirable potential future. The future isn’t something that happens to you, we are all involved in shaping it.
The Klick Health Strategic Futures team and wider Strategic community can be your partners in shaping that future.
Look forward to the next Klick Health cultural force, Value vs. Values, coming soon with more perspectives from the Strategy community at Klick.
Author
Meredydd Hardie
VP, Group Director Strategy
Meredydd is passionate about uncovering insights at the intersection of people, culture, and brand. With 15 years of experience, she has honed her skill translating signals into strategic intelligence. Her past roles in marketing involved providing innovative research methodologies and strategic insights for major brands like Coca-Cola and Toyota, enhancing their understanding of audience dynamics. At Klick, Meredydd applies her market research expertise across various healthcare domains, including oncology and mental health. She specializes in integrating diverse signal sources into research outputs from digital to market research, to guide Klick’s teams and clients in navigating the forces shaping the future.
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