Together: Why Social Connection Holds the Key to Better Health, Higher Performance, and Greater Happiness

by Vivek H. Murthy

When I began my rotations in the hospital as a third-year medical student, I was struck by the distinctions we typically made between emotional pain and physical pain. When we encountered physical pain in our patients, we would rush to determine the origin of the pain, asking questions, performing exams, and obtaining laboratory and imaging studies. And we would be aggressive about monitoring and treating the pain. When we discovered someone was experiencing emotional pain, we reacted with concern and compassion, but there was an underlying assumption that this was less of a concern and less consequential than physical pain. What few of us understood at the time was that, within the brain, there’s less difference between the two than we think. The sensory fibers that register emotional and physical pain overlap in the brain. This proximity means that loneliness, loss, or disappointment can produce symptoms similar to those caused by physical blows or wounds.24 If you feel shunned, researchers have found, you’re likely to flinch the same way you would if slapped. If the shunning and slapping occur during an fMRI, the same region of the brain (the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex) will light up in both events.