Americans are a lonely lot, and young people bear the heaviest burden

However, the Cigna survey didn't find a correlation between social media use and feelings of loneliness. This would on the surface contradict the new findings on screen time, but Holt-Lunstad says that previous research shows that how people use social media determine its influence on one's sense of isolation.

"If you're passively using it, if you're just scrolling feeds, that's associated with more negative effects," she says. "But if you're using it to reach out and connect to people to facilitate other kinds of [in-person] interactions, it's associated with more positive effects."

I don't even know if the [in person] part is strictly necessary, TBH... IMO just other, productive human interaction, online or off, helps with feeling less lonely. I have met some wonderful people who I genuinely do consider friends through social media, many of whom are here on ~ already. :)