Loneliness — W1
Designers | Alex Newson • Cat Acheing • Damul Yang • David Han • Maria C • Rikkie • Sue Heeyeon An • Tiana Robinson
External Partner | R/GA
Brief | Design a way to mitigate the effects of loneliness
Starting Point
From the briefing session from R/GA by Matthew Choksi and Zoha Zoya, they suggested our group to start the project by scoping what loneliness is and the effects of it, but also to identify how it differs from the target audiences. Before the internal meeting with the team we decided to conduct preliminary research individually. I started to look at statistical reports and readings about loneliness. The datas was quite shocking. As it states that around 7.4 million people across Great Britain said their well-being has been affected during lockdown which is called ‘lockdown lonely’ differing from ‘chronic lonely’. Also the majorities were age group of 18-24 years old (Office for National Statistics, 2020). Furthermore, I discovered how loneliness affects bodily functions hugely. It increases the levels of cortisol, major stress hormone, affects the production of white blood cells and more. In which, the emotional qualities do not stop but it develops into very profound physical effects.
Fig 1. Statistics and Literature Review. Image(s) by group
Directed Storytelling and Synthesis
However, to understand more from people in the age group of 18-24 years old we moved onto Directed Storytelling. For preparation I created a Loneliness Map template where people can draw their journey of loneliness based on time of the year and the levels. This was to start a conversation carefully about their experiences and to see the differences between pre and post COVID situations. Additionally, there were following questions including living situations, coping mechanisms and what it means being lonely for them. In total, we have spoken to 12 people. What was most intriguing for me was that some people weren’t recognising when exactly they decided to do something about it to combat the feeling of loneliness but it was more of an intuition for them trying to cope with loneliness by themselves.
Fig 2. Loneliness Map. Image by Sue
Fig 3. Directed Storytelling Documents. Image(s) by group
During synthesising all the research we were struggling to narrow them down since the situation all differed from each other but from this we noticed in general loneliness grows out from not having the support from the ones they need, a sense of disconnection and the feeling of boredom. Moreover, most of the people we spoke to were very relying on technology trying to stay in touch with others through Zoom calls and messenger applications as it was the only way they could stay connected, not entirely but partially - still missing the physical contact.
Fig 4. Affinity Map of Loneliness. Made by Tiana, Cat and Sue
Fig 5. Result of Directed Storytelling. Image by group
Fig 6. Benchmarking. Image(s) by Damul, Sue and Tiana
After benchmarking, through the discussion with group members our aim became to change the way we think of loneliness which is seen as a negative connotation to a positive aspect for the age group.
“Creative processes can enhance well-being and alleviate loneliness.”
The approaches were through 1. rediscovering home or a room where people tend to stay for a long time especially during the lockdown situation as a creative stage 2. Using everyday objects to explore and play 3. Promoting lockdown isolation into a method to discover creativity and finally 4. Combining creative processes whilst promoting interactions with others. From all these approaches we were trying to promote and bring back playfulness for people to cope with loneliness.
Reflections
The feedback we received were perhaps the aim was still a very board and but the concept of playfulness was a good place to start. There were a lot of effects of loneliness we have discovered yet, haven’t set entirely which ones we are looking at. Also we had to consider we were in a very early stage to set our boundaries already or to decide on any of the approaches without any further explorations.
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Bibliography
Sweet, J. (2020). The Loneliness Pandemic. Harvard Magazine. Available at: https://harvardmagazine.com/2021/01/feature-the-loneliness-pandemic (Accessed 17 Feb. 2021).
University of Cambridge (2020). Almost a quarter of adults living under lockdown in the UK have experienced loneliness. Available at: https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/almost-a-quarter-of-adults-living-under-lockdown-in-the-uk-have-experienced-loneliness (Accessed 17 Feb. 2021).
Office for National Statistics (2021) Coronavirus and loneliness, Great Britain. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/wellbeing/bulletins/coronavirusandlonelinessgreatbritain/3aprilto3may2020#measuring-the-data (Accessed: 17 April 2021).