What are some of the interesting things happening in this area of social isolation and loneliness research today?
Lynch: The most interesting thing is the development of a whole clinical model that is based on this information, and is used to help and treat coronary heart disease patients, and to look at how what we call the “hidden dialogue” can be used. An example of this “hidden dialogue” is blushing. If I am chatting with you and I blush, you see it, and you may sense my discomfort and change the subject to one that is more comfortable, because you don’t want to see me suffer, and you don’t want to feel uncomfortable! My vascular change (in my face) is a message to you. But if I blush inside due to elevated blood pressure and you don’t see it and I don’t feel it, conversations quickly become murderous! I feel misunderstood and you feel misunderstood. The body is a dialogic instrument; it’s not a machine. The essential thesis we now have is that there is a communal body. The body isn’t separate from the mind. We have a whole model now of using this research to help patients grasp why insight al
