on september 12th we'll find out who will take home this year's coveted golden lion . up next our documentary film looks at the epidemic of loneliness i'm brian thomas for the entire team thanks so much for being with us. of loneliness i'm brian thomas with the entire team thanks so much for being with us. they've been dragged over there so that's what it people experiences when their heritage is taken from them countless cultural artifacts were stolen from africa by

colonialists and carted off to europe. what should be done with the stolen north from africa. stolen soul starts september 7th on g.w. . feeling lonely around a lot of people isn't a contradiction in terms. christiane adi's has been living in hamburg for 6 months is a biologist who moved here for work now all he needs is a new circle of friends. coming i come from a small town with 20000 residents a big city has lots of people but you can feel lost. or you see other people since you don't know them you still feel lonely. maybe even lonelier because there are so many people. fascinated i've never been the kind of guy to go into a bar and chat to people. maybe as a student in

a student pub but otherwise i've never done that it's just not my thing is. this family lives far away in southern germany christiane lived in 100 before taking the job and homework leaving his university friends behind. they can leave admitting you're lonely is still a social taboo yet one in every 10 people are thought to be affected by it with grave consequences. studies show that chronic loneliness can make people ill physically as well as mentally. yet doctors and scientists are only beginning to understand why that is. is loneliness a personal problem or a serious social issue. like christiane many people feel lonely and isolated after a move. germany's federal statistical office says each year 6 percent of the

population moves home. christiane works on his own out the field with no colleagues for companionship. my son hitting it at 1st i spent many nights sitting at home on the sofa but because i didn't know where to go to meet people mr coffin couldn't summon the energy to find out how to finish the noida. christiane adi says apartment is located in southern humble work in the enix of a single family home. originally he planned to move in with his long term girlfriend but then they broke up. i think i'm someone who doesn't much like being alone but i'm trying to enjoy the single life and learning to deal with it. even though it's quite an adjustment and not so easy in this office. i just feel so lonely and socially isolated as i live off the beaten path. sam a bit depressed because i just miss people human contact conduct.

but how can you find new friends it's not easy to meet other singles in this neighborhood which is mainly home to families. but single person households are increasingly common in europe in germany 41 percent of people live alone. in sweden it's a huge 51 percent while in portugal in slovakia it's just 22 percent. christiane decided to take action after finding out about a friendship app called 25 friends registered users can meet up at gatherings or activities with a limited number of participants christiane quickly created a profile providing his name date of birth and a photo now he was ready to meet other users the bigger the city the more invitations there are to join in group activities they doing with these days online

dating is commonplace so i thought why not i mean it's worth a try. for me and i'll probably be perfect but i'm on the go a lot so i can get to know people in the city on the way of all magicians and. at the whole university in the western german city of. researchers investigate the effects of loneliness on the human psyche. michael lumen is a psychologist and her research she differentiates between being alone social isolation and loneliness. against mr she says i love how it's important to realize that loneliness isn't the same as being alone we understand loneliness to be the subjective feeling that the social contacts or relationships you have aren't enough that you have fewer than you'd like all maybe the relationships aren't as good as you'd like people suffer from that it hurts as much as physical pain.

some people contacts others feel well connected with just 2 friends. but being a lonely for a long time changes a person and possibly others to skip studion the lead there are studies which suggest that loneliness is contagious one of the effects of loneliness is that you withdraw from others all simply become a somewhat more unpleasant person. the size that means relationships suffer when a person is lonely and in the long run your partner can start to feel lonely too i know some of. the causes of loneliness are as diverse as the people themselves however they're identifiable risk factors primarily health problems or major life changes like a separation a move or unemployment or mental health issues like depression.

but what about being poor. sociologist sebastian link is the co-author of a study which examines how poverty influences social relationships. then define our mood when we talk about poverty we need to be conscious that poverty is a phenomenon that's accompanied by social withdrawal and a sense of shame and charm good food i'm here and of course that also makes the poor less miserable. couldn't see it. in germany anyone who earns less than 60 percent of the average net income so less than $1100.00 euros per month is said to be poor. link study shows that poverty makes it hard to build and maintain social relationships poor people don't fully participate in society. today is a must and link is visiting a neighborhood project in berlin's courts back district. he greets the organizers.

social workers carla miranda in tim organized neighborhood meetings along with 3 cooking courses art classes and yoga sessions. they lend a sympathetic ear to the locals problems they just might catch up on the forget if i know i don't have much money where can i meet new people if i conquer 2 restaurants with the cinema that's hard to see if this here is very low threshold but i just come in and there's something for me there are people who greet me and want me to stay. and most of what's on offer here is free on the cost and also. the boston link study shows that after 2 years of living in poverty people are less likely to meet with friends and it seemed that almost all the longer people live in poverty the more the social fabric changes. for instance we can see that when people have been poor for a longer period of time there are fewer contacts who are rich in resources in their

close social network. and that's that. cooking with friends is a free weekly event today over 30 local residents are taking part. in. student and single mom jennifer hope no feels she's in good company here. i think and again it's really a question of money i don't get any student grants or any other financial aid from the state i have to earn the money myself and with 2 children it's not that easy to meet people today's or anything like that. and here i can come into contact with all kinds of people and bring much child along oh that's a huge help could then take us to study here possible. creating meeting places and letting everyone participate fully in society are

important for combating social isolation and loneliness. the swiss town of talk isn't one of the world's richest countries but even prosperity can't always keep loneliness at bay. my own woman tyler is 77 years old and lives alone. a man esteemed that you're sad and it makes you tired. thing you think what do i do now. and withdraw a little bit i mean trick cut she says that it's just awful to feel so lonely and so i had someone just. my as a partner died 2 years ago they lived together for 21 years and she nursed him right to the end. after his death my own health began to decline

as much as i fly but you just have to go on. and there are days that go really well where you're happy. so you can't understand when suddenly the sadness hits you. when you're so alone and there's no one around to talk to and it's not easy but if. dennis and i sign for hard. these sometimes you don't want to go out anymore you're just blocked somehow they have care to convey. and somehow to my loneliness in old age is particularly challenging because especially among the very elderly loneliness has very specific causes that are almost impossible to combat for example impaired health that's simply age related or the loss of a close relative. those can't be easily replaced you can just tell someone and find

a new spouse and already well again. mine are used to be well connected in her neighborhood she also met her former partner here. but the older people went away and younger ones came forth for that people used to have time for a chat but that happens less these days is that i mean they're. the ones provincial town of talk is now a booming business location that attracts ex-pats from all around the world. on a fast bent who was born into spells out the consequences i think you get out of here and soon it's evident how many single households we have how many ex-pats who are here for a few months or years and then disappear. people have less and less contact with one another so the family unit is in decline and fall off if we keep building

family homes which are then occupied by singles. it's problematic when we see neighborhoods going to pieces and the resulting lack of solidarity. those on a fast bend is co-founder of the kiss foundation short for keep it small and simple . since 2016 its team has been establishing new neighborhood networks and to prevent social isolation also the other idea is to strengthen social cohesion too quickly i say quickly in quotation marks to quickly get people connected so that they can support one another and this is the basically they take responsibility on their own strength and solidarity that's what's most important to the city he said . this helps neighbors help one another with car rides shopping or going out on walks no money changes hands instead the network's 200 members document the time

spent it's then credited to their time account. so they can seek help in return or save up credit for later. the biggest demand is for conversation 1960 hours were booked last year alone. help with everyday activities was next but 1917 hours. coos has changed miles life through it she met you did fisher who's been paying my a regular visits for a year now. i think oh oh. it's great great the. i'm with you that is a lawyer who lives nearby today she's helping my attend her garden something she can't do want her own. regular interaction has been shown to increase people's life satisfaction kiss member unit fisher profits to. yes

modestly my you months that i 1st time someone from kiss is always on hand they introduce the people and see if they're a good match. i hope that we would get along. but when i saw her i knew right away that she was right for me. and so we found one another. she's a wonderful woman who always helps me. even . knowing that their help or is being compensated with a time credit makes it easier for some to accept assistance if. they don't feel like they're accepting charity. so this kid can see here this conflict gives both of us a sense of security i can go away on holiday knowing someone's looking after my garden someone who knows about gardening as you can see. and in turn she knows that

if something's up she can call me on the roof and say that it's so reassuring isn't it today you did has added another hour to our time account it could be an investment that will pay off in the future when she herself might be in need of companionship or practical help. but it. at the university of casa sociologist yarnall shaw been conducts lectures and research on social isolation and friendship. now and then he enjoys being on his own and having time to think but being alone by choice is not the same as being a lonely. after all the most of taking time out and focusing on yourself are ways in which you also test the boundaries of being human and since many signs are hostages that in a way being alone is

a very particular and in the modern day also highly prized life experience and it's a specifically human one would you want encounter any other way. and this withdrawal is actually a unique opportunity to learn something about yourself so you can view it positively too on ones or put it if they're. still a few people can stand being alone for too long. after a certain time the desire for contact interaction becomes overpowering. experts call this impulse to seek the company of others the real affiliation motive . you mentioned since it's had a visa in place in the us social creatures which ultimately means that we as a group need it others to survive think about the stone age alone as didn't get phone lines and according to this theory the feeling of loneliness evolved as

a warning signal so that when we were 11 and missing our group when we no longer feel part of it we suffer. and that makes us try to rejoin our try stalked and that's what it does have his all come to cope of it out of. the biology of loneliness is also being probed in southern germany. here near xylem in play constance 200 barbary apes live on 20 hectares of woodland in groups of up to 40 animals. behavioral ecologist like nadine miller kline hope their research on these primates will provide insights into human evolution and that we can't really look at whether animals are lonely because that's subjective what we can look at is social isolation and integration and asks how do they influence their health. barbary apes have very differentiated social relationships the males tend to forge a close alliance of similar human friendships those who don't make enough ties

remain on the groups fringes. and. always choose one animal to be your focal subject and then collect data for certain amount of time once you've gathered the data you can see how many partners you animal interacted with how many it groomed and how many partners it came into contact at that from that you can draw conclusions about the animals relationship structure as. well connected males are more successful in the fight to climb the social ladder they also meet. their needs in the palm side when lots of aggression occur as like now during mating season and animals have a lot of aggressive interaction that can be stressful but the animals who have strong connections experience less stress the animals who have a few strong connections and are a bit isolated are far more affected by the stressful situation that i thought these are stressing so that's one few female. she tests but the presence of the

stress hormone cortisol on the animal species. apes release cortisol when they feel threatened as a human. this response triggers our emergency fight or flight response. that boosts our blood pressure blood sugar level and circulatory system. our immune systems and digestion are dialed down. chronically lonely people become chronically stressed which can seriously impact their health. the risk of having a heart attack rises by 29 percent a stroke by 32 percent and the likelihood of dying prematurely by 30 percent. or chronic loneliness reduces life expectancy as much as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. having high blood pressure. or being obese.

in the u.k. the british red cross says loneliness has reached epidemic levels here over 9000000 people are almost one 5th of the population have said they are always often lonely . and $28000.00 the government appointed a loneliness minister. tracey crouch pursues a strategy called social prescribing. we find out how it works and from miss out west of england. from in the mendip district in somerset has just 20000 residents but it boasts an extraordinary health services network run by doctors and dedicated locals. but. today a few of them are paying a visit to the men's shed. it's

a workshop designed to combat social isolation. men often find it harder to admit they're lonely than women. patrick abraham started the project 2 years ago. if you put 12 men over 65 in a room and said talk to each other about your life your relationships your health and your aspirations 6 will leave the room immediately and the other 6 will sit around the walls and say nothing if you throw a broken norma or in there and say hey guys fix that within i don't know who's what others the skills they have who they are and then names and everything else. the longer people are socially isolated the tougher it is for them to reintegrate that's how it was for me in williams after a long stint living in australia he returned to frome 2 years ago although his sister lives here he's had trouble meeting people my phone so i'm

a bit on the out so you know like a group of people when you're on the outside you've got to make the effort to step in and we'll show you a person really seen sister found out about the men shed on the internet through the health connections network and urged him to go there. or came down and open the door. for the body looks just like the usual copy you know he was open to all who came to be looked after through the 0 one word and even if they were said come in come in you know we have a laugh and a joke and then when we talk about talk about phase in general we know that we can fix breakfast in 3 minutes for you and a lot of stuff you know once a week gives you something. for and for the common you know young got to calm you come because you want to and because you want to meet people. today julie carey downs is also visiting the mention. she works for health

connections mendip and has an overview of all the networks initiatives it's her job to maintain and expand the network. news and it just. she asks at the shed could open in the evenings too so younger men could come i think the few people who are working would be really interested to comment because it's like once they finish work they quite isostacy they think if they could. speak. a stock it might you say see this is why julie coulter self health connector. that's because she connects doctors and patients with the many public and private outreach programs for people and from. the community itself involved if. they're not being. told to do things that are actually part of it and they feel. that i want people they tend to.

think. 6 years ago a doctor at this medical practice declared war on loneliness. local dr helen kingston realized many of her patients were suffering from social isolation. and so was their health. to this community it matters to me what happens here and i know my patients very well i've been here for over 20 years so when you see individuals that you've got to know very well and see them struggling it's a human instinct to want to try and turn things around and make a situation response to. just the medical ones. over the years helen kingston observed that around 70 percent of her appointments weren't just about physical complaints. but she lacked the resources to help these

patients. very much. and then in 2013 she finally got the resources to make a change. she built up a team of people whose 1st task was to gather info on all the services and assistance available to the people and from everything from choir rehearsals to debt counseling and self-help groups. now when doctors are talking to their patients they have the in for their fingertips and can offer advice. the idea is known as social prescribing patients needing more support to refer to a health connector like julie carey downs what i like is it's quite a holistic approach that you're asking people about their health and well being without it off to be not clinical or magical and it's supporting very and become more in control of their own health and wellbeing in a more resilient. kingston's team instead break the vicious circle of social

isolation and illness in many cases they succeed people end up in crisis less often they end up in hospital less often and as a result of that those very expensive imaginative missions that are using up so much results within the n.h.s. have reduced. one study found that the number of unplanned hospital admissions and from fell by 14 percent. in the surrounding areas admissions rose by 28.5 percent during the same period. the project has successfully tackled a serious problem. and some kite hats learning is has serious health implications and that's why it's so important to combat social isolation to learning this is problematic when it becomes chronic when it occurs for long periods in such cases learning this can lead to illness we know that loneliness is associated with

a whole range of physical complaints including cardiovascular problems obesity and possibly dementia there are numerous studies which show that lonely people even die early at the mentions off wished album. right and can i think of that yes. but yes. evelyn cohen moved to from from london to be near her family to live with her daughter and son and. she lost her husband 31 years ago so thanks again we well at the moment yes yes is there anything else that you know i don't think so i quite. i don't think idea of islam is i have. a 99 i would hide if i live

till next september i should be a 100. i used to have loads and loads of friends and you know i'm the only one left the whole circle night and all the rest of got. a year ago evelyn suffered a severe blow when her only daughter died from cancer at the age of 73. evelyn withdrew or she didn't want to burden her son in law and grandchildren with her grief meanwhile her health steadily deteriorated. you don't know what is happening and why it's happening you know when. you don't know if you can cope or know but it's a case of got. evelyn's doctors were concerned so health connector contacted her and now visits regularly. evelyn's condition has gradually improved. somebody that is what you call

neutral more or less you know when they can so. you can talk and you can get the tears roll down him and you know do. relate and they make you feel much better yeah it was like a lifeline really i was there anything that you want to ask me at the moment to say something that you need to. increase. how much about you. yeah ok yeah. something nice to get fly don't take it. julie has one more appointment today a training course at a high school in front. and she wants to know if loneliness is an issue

for the pupils. i'm cheveley i'm from have connections made 1st of all i've got a brief power point but i'm going to get you to do some work while. these young people are in their final year of high school. julie hopes to convince them to become volunteer community connectors. the idea is how do we get everybody out to the community to know about a website know that we have based in the medical practices to support people and also get them to let us know where the gaps are on last where community connect is come in and what you're going to be doing is signpost and you're not going to take in anybody's information you're not going to become slushy not taken anything like that you're just going to tell people about where they can go to find out about groups and services. during.

its but 1st they need to understand what influences health and wellbeing. the next week on these social media social media but i think importantly everyone in the right place is it's always you've always got to figure out you for with scott people who are supposedly better than you so you can really damage your self image and yourself were in fact a lot of young people feel isolated and lonely and i think that is the area that we are trying to lock up set in groups for come the new year. but sometimes social media can help young people make friends. christiane id's is heading for home board city center. he hopes to help make some contacts there through the friendship about 25 friends. tonight there's a gathering where people will eat burgers and play billiards. with total strangers

. and some elders are registering is one thing going is another you have an accounting to go but you must set off and dare to try it. but even in the real world social media has a big influence. some people post their entire lives on instagram you think how awesome they're doing great every day they're on vacation or doing core stuff but it depends whether you like to influence you or not if you say ok i'm jealous or if you view things rationally and say stupid to be true. to date there's little reliable data on how social media is changing our relationships but the us study found that people who use social media for more than 2 hours a day were twice as likely to feel lonely as people who used it for less than 30 minutes per day. just. in my is the sure the problem with most of the studies on this topic is that we can tell

what's cause and what's effect does social media make people odia or do lonely people tend to use social media because they have fewer contacts offline having a contact offline. the studies can't answer that question in principle you can say that social media can enrich and expand social relationships fast when they start to replace offline relationships when people only chat online and don't have any personal contact in one on one off then it becomes problematic because initial contact it's probably much. the group is arranged to meet in front of the burger restaurant. or in the other they only got 25 years into the episode. and i think. for. the street that's what it was like i i

ran into a tape one of the founders of the friendship app organized this event. 20 participants have registered but just 8 have shown up like this yes i want when i get really good it was just the start of but the defender is up. to. the app's target audience is 25 to 35 year olds it attracts people who've just moved here like christiane and those who just want to expand their circle of friends not sneak out like make use of what is indefensible to say that the irish banks to get cities must look at. them and this isn't just because i got to talk and i start this is after finding friends to play sports with over an online platform rahman i tell you realize there is a real need for a friendship. not terribly sexy to say you're using a friendship hop but this is

a real problem that many people have. we organize group gatherings and try to make them as not real as possible so that removes some of the shame and the protection of being in a group is also an important factor it's all good people like coming to such events because they don't make them feel strange. the group has reserved 2 tables at the billiards club next door. with. some of the guys tell us why they're here. stephanie she's just following which is tough for me. i know a little german. but when you come to a city where you don't know anyone nights like this are quite helpful and it's almost a language your my long term relationship ended and through that i lost all my friends and getting to know folks in a big city is tough so the ups being good for that so from. the sunlight that's it i told people about it when they asked what are you doing on the weekend i said

playing billiards and in burgers who with total strangers people don't think that's strange these days lots of things are done on line it's not the 1st time it's like meeting up with 10 or 20 complete strangers at 1st you have to make small talk but once the conversation flows it is better to nice being quite nice. but will real friendships emerge from this 1st meeting. at the university of casa young children in his research group or working on friendship networks. the sociologist knows that for around 10 percent of germans friends are more important than family. when i can to a certain degree friends can qualify as a substitute family. from what we've seen in studies that applies across the board

. so all the forms of practical support you need in life can generally be provided by friends childcare helping build you up again after emotionally tough phases of life. where i see major difficulties is in the area of caregiving personal hygiene washing calming us everything that goes into basic day care the stats show that friends hardly ever do this. for his research young children analyze of lots of statistics but he also conducts many biographical studies. today he's interviewing a subject. that student narcissa has volunteered to take part in a detailed biographical analysis. and we're doing a study on our peoples and people's lives and asking how you perceive them specifically how they change your social network in the end zone what if and that one starts this basically there are

a few constants in my life. my family. and the 2 or 3 friends i've had since grade school like my gosh with. the last major of people in our systems life occurred a year ago she and her then boyfriend split up. the end of a relationship is one of the biggest risk factors for loneliness. and that's my circle of friends has actually changed investment quite apart from my best friend that is she's almost like family is so. far as a so she's friends with your mom and sister to the yeah yeah you could say that yes it's a unified what's interesting about this case is that the most stable relationships are those that are also connected to family so the friendships which survive the breakup were those where there were also relationships to family members you know a friend from her neighborhood a close friend had other contacts in the neighborhood and through them her network was refilled or healed guy ed. but even family structures can break

down reducing the number of people that someone can turn to in an emergency. calls list a shortage of connective resources. there are definitely situations where it becomes clear that there's no longer anyone there or just one or 2 people. here the discussion revolves around how they deal with that. how do they bear such a phase of extreme social isolation without anyone to support them and then we go into details again and said i. people who suffer from chronic loneliness often require psychological help and a consequence for lines on kuyt hara docs sickly one of the consequences of loneliness is that people withdrawals so it's incredibly tough to reach lonely people because by definition they're not easily reachable. and one of the symptoms

of loneliness is not being able to go and seek out other people on the health and that's precisely the problem for many programs or measures designed to tackle loneliness they aren't able to get through to the people they're actually trying to reach. one. mid january humble work. he says had some luck in finding a friend. waiting to go. at an event organized through the friendship that he met terrence they hit it off right away. you know if i had often enough i've always been this way i never had tons of friends just a couple really good ones and i'd count terrence as one of them. sold him off point of this is how it's all going to come to the friendships i want to feel i can

trust someone confide in them and long and the other small but also that you can rely on one of the other one of the dear to bring the things that are on your mind and then always have things that might make it easier for the other person to do the same wonderful out of life stuff. finding a friend over social media for christiane the gamble has paid off. so he's not likely to forget the pain of loneliness for a long while to come. i think that's when you can find something positive in everything positive. in my case i'd say it's how you only know the value of friendship when you no longer feel so alone as well and if it then if you are nice it is and how bad you felt before what you only notice that afterwards. being alone is part of being human to avoid becoming lonely it helps to take action early on and build up a social network. we can all contribute but it takes much more than that here if we

as a society speak out and stress that learning this is something normal something many people feel that would go a long way to helping those affected of course that wouldn't solve the problem but it might encourage us to talk about it a bit move on the sphere stack. little boy. how do you feel. every one of the recent terror in the last year says the goal of i respect them

a testimony to the airplanes are one to watch. the entire industry has to reinvent itself. it's now careening between forced optimism and just wanted me to ensure. the tremendous fall d.w. . cutting through the noise. floor i come from people are known for being tough but fair to your target a lot of people tell it like it it was the they call it the concrete jungle the melting pot the city that never sleeps it's this energy that makes it feel like old but amid the hustle it's important to listen and pay attention because it's not just the loudest voices who need to be heard we all have a story to tell if i see it is my job as a journalist to go beyond the obvious now i'm basing your mum my work takes me around the world but my it seems for me in the state to tell the important stories

behind the headlines what is the heart of the story why does it matter who live in paris. to stay focused if you want customers to cut through the noise to get to the troops to fight over sarah kelly and i want to do definitely going to. play. the bass player. this is d w news live from berlin justice for those killed in the charlie hebdo terror attack more than 5 years on the trial begins the 14 people accused of aiding the attack on

the french satirical magazine that some say mocked is. also coming off a notorious temper whoosh killer is dead the man known as comrade dog led the genocide of the killing fields in cambodia that's also 2000000 people brutally murdered and.