Americans are choosing to be alone. Here’s why we should reverse that.

The covid-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on our social lives. Cancellations, closures and fear of a potentially deadly infection led us to hunker down and avoid acquaintances, co-workers and extended family. Time spent with friends went down. Time spent alone went up.

Thanksgiving was not spared. Americans spent 38 percent less time with friends and extended family over the Thanksgiving weekend in the past two years than they had a decade prior.

And now for the scarier news: Our social lives were withering dramatically before covid-19. Between 2014 and 2019, time spent with friends went down (and time spent alone went up) by more than it did during the pandemic.

According to the Census Bureau’s American Time Use Survey, the amount of time the average American spent with friends was stable, at 6½ hours per week, between 2010 and 2013. Then, in 2014, time spent with friends began to decline.

By 2019, the average American was spending only four hours per week with friends (a sharp, 37 percent decline from five years before). Social media, political polarization and new technologies all played a role in the drop. (It is notable that market penetration for smartphones crossed 50 percent in 2014.)