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submitted 7 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

Years after the U.S. began to slowly emerge from mandatory COVID-19 lockdowns, more than half of older adults still spend more time at home and less time socializing in public spaces than they did pre-pandemic, according to new CU Boulder research. 

Participants cited fear of infection and “more uncomfortable and hostile” social dynamics as key reasons for their retreat from civic life.

“The pandemic is not over for a lot of folks,” said Jessica Finlay, an assistant professor of geography whose findings are revealed in a series of new papers. “Some people feel left behind.”

The study comes amid what the U.S. Surgeon General recently called an “epidemic of loneliness” in which older adults—especially those who are immune compromised or have disabilities—are particularly vulnerable.

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[-] squeakycat@lemmy.ml 14 points 7 months ago

It's such a tragedy that we humans are surrounded by so many people yet have to endure such isolation. Just a few years ago I was practically completely isolated. I feel very fortunate to have sprouted and made a community. To have continued down that path of loneliness would have been incredibly hard.

[-] MisterNeon@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

7000 doesn't sound like a large enough sample size to get accurate results.

[-] otp@sh.itjust.works 3 points 7 months ago

What would sound large enough to you?

[-] MisterNeon@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago
[-] otp@sh.itjust.works 4 points 7 months ago
[-] MisterNeon@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

The age of the American population 55+ is over 80,000,000 so 0.0000875% of that population seems small to be drawing conclusions from.

[-] Mathprogrammer1@sh.itjust.works 8 points 7 months ago

That's not how statistics works. If that were true, you could never test dice for fairness because there are theoretically an infinite number of rolls that could happen

[-] MisterNeon@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

Well I don't generate statistics normally and we're not dealing with something as reliable as dice roles. I stated the sample size "sounds" small and got downvoted into a pit. I'm going to remain skeptical about this research.

this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2024
59 points (100.0% liked)

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