Dining alone can be a lonely affair. Lack of social connection could change the way your body processes your meal.
A new study published in Scientific advances has now found evidence that eating with others could help your body balance your blood sugar levels.
In experiments, 108 participants consumed just over 100 grams of white wheat bread. For the next two hours, the researchers monitored their blood sugar response.
In one scenario, participants ate the bread alone. In another scenario, they were accompanied by a close companion.
In the social scenario, blood sugar levels increased less and returned to baseline more quickly than in the alone scenario.
The authors argue that this corresponds to a “robust phenomenon” in humans.
“Blood sugar regulation is not just about what we eat, but also who we eat with,” says Shir Atzil of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel.
“Our relationships play an active biological role in our physical well-being.”
Atzil and his colleagues argue that their findings provide proof of concept for the principle of “social physiology.”
It is a biological framework for understanding how the connections between our inner and outer lives have evolved over time.
Social physiology could explain at least part of why we, as a species, are motivated to cooperate: we are interdependent organisms that depend on each other for better survival.
You can see it in our blood, even when we are not physically touching.
“We used to think of the body as an isolated system that regulates itself,” says Atzil.
“Our results show that human physiology is inherently social. Being close to someone you love reduces the physical energy your body expends to regulate itself. This gives us a direct metabolic advantage to being together and reveals a fundamental evolutionary reason why humans form bonds in the first place: our bodies work better together.”
In other social animals, such as fruit flies, rodents, pigs, and monkeys, studies suggest that isolation can shorten lifespan, suppress the immune system, or amplify stress responses.
But for ethical reasons, this type of experiment is not carried out on humans.
Instead, researchers use small changes in how the body functions alone rather than in social contexts to better understand how we change in the presence of others.
Blood sugar responses are a smart way to do this.
When mice are socially isolated, studies have shown that it impairs their insulin signaling and impairs their metabolic function, increasing the risk of obesity.
In humans, in comparison, loneliness is associated with dysregulated glycemic control and predicts type 2 diabetes.
“While previous work has focused on the consequences of social isolation, the present study identifies a direct and quantifiable benefit of social proximity in glucose metabolism,” the authors explain.
The team’s experiments compared how the human body responds to the same carbohydrate meal when alone or in company.
They also conducted parallel experiments with 116 participants, testing how the body responds to exposure to cold.
When a partner was present, body temperature regulation was more effective, especially when the two people were touching.
But even when no one touched it, there were benefits.
In another series of experiments conducted with 115 adults and 56 mother-child pairs, participants were subjected to a stress challenge.
This produced a weaker arousal response, such as increased sweating, when another person was present, even if they were not physically skin-to-skin.
This arousal response also improved more quickly in companionship.
The results suggest that having someone nearby, even if you don’t touch them, could help your body function more efficiently.
The question of what these long-term effects will be remains open, but population studies generally suggest that loneliness is not good for our overall health.
Data suggests that individuals with stronger social ties tend to be healthier, happier and live longer.
Conversely, social isolation is associated with increased metabolic disorders, cardiovascular disease, cancer, slower wound healing, decreased sleep efficiency, and mortality.
The world’s largest study on happiness has been underway for 88 years.
After analyzing hundreds of peer-reviewed articles and countless questionnaires, medical exams, and in-person interviews with participants, researchers found that close relationships were one of the best predictors of a happy, meaningful life.
Surrounding ourselves with our loved ones seems to be intrinsically good for us.
This could change the way our bodies cope on a tiny level, but with big repercussions.
The research was published in Scientific advances.
Gn Health
