# Why does being alone make you go crazy? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 28, 2002, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335 "2002-11-28T13:38:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/1 "2002-11-28T13:38:53Z")
How come humans can’t cope sometimes for long periods of time, being alone? It comes across my mind that a large proportion of people who have been stranded or forgotten eventually become crazy. Why does this happen? Does an imbalance in the mind occur when you don’t have human contact? ---
**Author:** ![scm1001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c4cdca/32.png) [@scm1001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scm1001)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/2 "2002-11-28T14:13:26Z")
I suspect that several things are occuring. Without people around you you lose social skills and social awareness. Thus you may appear or sound slightly odd, even if you are mentally sound. As well, many isolated spots (desert islands, prison cells) may lack stimulation. This appears to bring on a neurosis similar to that of caged animals, where repetitive movements (swaying etc) are common, presumably because the brain is trying to stimulate itself. Brains do seem to need stimulation to function properly, I suspect without constant stimulation many nerve pathways wither, causing strange behaviour, and other pathways that are more resistant take over, causing one to hear voices. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/3 "2002-11-28T14:19:58Z")
Would that explain people with schitzophenia? (sorry, don’t know how to spell properly!) ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/4 "2002-11-28T14:42:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ryan\_Liam \* > \*\*How come humans can’t cope sometimes for long periods of time, being alone? It comes across my mind that a large proportion of people who have been stranded or forgotten eventually become crazy. Why does this happen? Does an imbalance in the mind occur when you don’t have human contact? \*\* Like a lot of animals, human beings are instinctively programmed to live with other humans. Our survival changes are enhanced if we cooperate with other humans, so we have an innate desire to interact with other humans. It’s a physiological drive, like your sex drive. Denying that drive will have physiological implications, just like denyng any other basic human desire. I think you would find that totally isolating any social animal would have a similar effect. Dogs are very social animals; a dog completely isolated from all humans and other dogs would likely begin to go nuts. ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/5 "2002-11-28T16:18:25Z")
At the bottom, sanity is the ability to integrate into social settings, and interact with other human beings. If there are no other human beings, no integration can take place. Keep that up for long periods, and you have a loss of habits of socialization that we (the greater social group) consider odd, or in the extreme, insane. However much you might dress it up in pseudoscientific jargon, sanity is acting like other people. ## Tris “When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other.” ~ Eric Hoffer ~ ---
**Author:** ![wolfsbane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/aeb1de/32.png) [@wolfsbane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfsbane)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/6 "2002-11-28T16:32:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RickJay \* Dogs are very social animals; a dog completely isolated from all humans and other dogs would likely begin to go nuts. \*\* This is why dogs who are chained up in the yard bark incessantly and become aggressive. They are slowly going insane due to the social isolation. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/7 "2002-11-28T17:10:24Z")
What signs could you identify for a human? ---
**Author:** ![Reuben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/54ee81/32.png) [@Reuben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reuben)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/8 "2002-11-28T17:19:04Z")
I hear they ask a lot of questions on internet message boards… 🙂 Seriously? Check this page out : [http://www.sharelynx.net/A\_Strategy\_For\_Losers/Solitude.htm](http://www.sharelynx.net/A_Strategy_For_Losers/Solitude.htm) > [@](#): > > But solitude is not always to be regarded positively. The chapter on “Enforced Isolation” is prefaced by a quote from Francis Bacon. “The worse solitude is to be destitute of sincere friendship”. In this chapter Storr analyses the effects of solitude in conditions of solitary confinement, the psychological torture of political dissidents, sensory deprivation and the like. In these cases the mental breakdowns that result are no different, though Storr does not say it, from the symptoms of schizophrenia - namely \*\*hallucinations, confusion, extreme anxiety, a lack of care about personal appearance and habits. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/9 "2002-11-28T18:09:48Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ryan\_Liam \* > \*\*Would that explain people with schitzophenia? (sorry, don’t know how to spell properly!) \*\* No. Schizophrenia is essentially biochemical. As yet, no one had been able to determine if there are any specific “causes”, but it is clear that people with schizophrenia seem to all have significant neurochemical imbalances (neurotransmitters allow communication between brain cells). There also seems to be some indication that they have an irregular pattern of certain brain cells that _should_ be nice and orderly. So solitude won’t necessarily lead to schizophrenia, but the erratic behaviour of a schizophrenic person may lead to social isolation. ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2002, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-being-alone-make-you-go-crazy/139335/10 "2002-11-28T22:22:51Z")
I asked a similar question a couple of years ago, but didn’t get a definitive answer. [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33563](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33563) The book reviewed in **Reuben** ’s link above looks interesting. I think I’ll check it out the next time I’m at the library.