Page 253 - Total War on PTSD

being alone makes it that much harder to face the adversities of this world. Therefore, “sticking together” and fostering benevolent social relationships emerge as imperative for our survival as a species (Holt-Lunstad, 2018).
Stemming from this fundamental aspect of human nature are several togetherness- promoting mechanisms, the most conspicuous of which is our proneness to feel lonely when social ties dwindle (J. T. Cacioppo & Cacioppo, 2018; J. T. Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008). From an evolutionary perspective, loneliness is viewed as an internal signal that there is need for to remedy social compromise. This works much like the manner in which thirst and hunger operate as internal signals that the body needs liquids or more substantial nourishment. It is this view of loneliness and social relationships that has led to the bourgeoning field of social neuroscience. Indeed, social neuroscientists have conducted voluminous amounts of research indicating that loneliness, if not attended to, may not only lead to extremely detrimental outcomes, including hindered well-being, poor mental and physical health and even premature death (J. T. Cacioppo & Cacioppo, 2018; S. Cacioppo, Grippo, London, Goossens, & Cacioppo, 2015); but may be embedded into various physiological systems (J. T. Cacioppo, Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cole, 2015; S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014).
Unfortunately, loneliness presents a real problem for many Veterans. To exemplify, in a study among aging Vietnam Veterans, 44% reported feeling lonely at least some of the time, and of these, 10.4% reported feeling lonely often (Kuwert, Knaevelsrud, & Pietrzak, 2014). Another study, among Israeli Veterans, indicated that for Veterans who experienced a mental breakdown on the battlefield, loneliness rates remained high for decades after the war (Solomon, Bensimon, Greene, Horesh, & Ein-Dor, 2015). This pervasiveness places Veterans at increased risk for loneliness’ aforementioned deleterious impact. Indeed, scientific work focusing specifically on Veterans’ loneliness, albeit surprisingly scarce (G. Wilson, Hill, & Kiernan, 2018), indicates that this loneliness may be strongly related to and exacerbated by Veterans’ psychiatric conditions (e.g., their depression as well as acute and chronic post-traumatic stress reactions; Kuwert et al., 2014; Martin & Hartley, 2017; Solomon et al., 2015), and highly conducive of suicidal
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